A Quiet Defiance
by indiaga
Summary: Post-Aliyah Tiva angsty-ness. There is a difference between being rescued and being saved, and, as the dust settles, the team wonders whether what they've done will ever be enough.
1. Beginning

**Just a random take on the idea that Ziva has history with the guys keeping her hostage. Another way for me to vent my spleen about the stupid cliff-hanger ending. Argh!**

**Disclaimer: Yeah. Not mine.**

He kisses her.

He kisses her, and it makes her sick. His skin is harsh and the stubble slices into the cuts that cross her face. He slices right through her.

"Tell me."

She is silent. His kisses turn to bites and now he is clawing the skin from her bones with his wicked silver blade.

"Tell me."

A dull punch to her side forces the chair to fall. The concrete rises and slams into her cheekbone. She feels herself splinter.

"Tell me all about Leon Vance."

Nothing. Blood spurts.

"All about Jethro Gibbs."

The fire rushes along her nerves. It reaches her mouth. She screams.

"That's right. Tell me all about your precious little Tony DiNozzo."

"Fuck you." She is quiet and calm. Level. He stops, surprised, and then his boot retracts and pummels oh so beautifully into her stomach. Curiously, she thinks of babies, curled and warm like little pink prawns inside every beaming swollen stomach. She thinks about what she could have been. What she could have had. She thinks of all her possible children screaming inside her, and she cries for them.

"Tut tut, David. No tears, remember? Remember what Daddy told you."

She tries to lash out but he dodges, chuckling. Reaches for her face and holds it reverently between his palms. Like a parent holding a child. Imparting wisdom. Truth. He tells the truth.

"Why are you still protecting them? They all betrayed you. All abandoned you. Gibbs...Tony. Remember what he did to you, little Ziva David? Remember what he took from you?"

"Yes."

"Oh, yes, you do, there we go. Little Ziva David. Remember when I carried you on my shoulders to the ice cream parlour, when you were little? Remember? You were so tiny, even then."

Another foot smashes into her fragile bones. They break like baby birds. Her eyes are open and unseeing. Glazed with pain and a terrible resignation. She shudders.

"Don't cry little David. Baby Ziva. Just tell us everything about them. We'll make it stop. Send you back to your daddy."

There is blood in her mouth. There is blood everywhere, all over her face and the floor and his shoe and his hands. His knife. His face, with bad bad black eyes and a desperate mouth. A voice sings, true and free, inside her head. She imagines them all. Abby. The childlike smile, large young eyes. Bouncing black pigtails. The gawky, awkward grace of the girl. Ducky, with his gravely voice and long-suffering gaze and knowing eyes. McGee. His round face, earnest and determined. His Tony glare. His floppy hair. Gibbs. Ice blue and rock hard. Cold like marble, and yet he can twinkle. He knows all and is surprised by nothing. He thinks by day and drinks by night.

And Tony. Imagine every detail. His tanned face and hazel eyes. Green. How his hair hung. His smile looked natural and eternally boyish. And yet his skin had been hot and his kisses real. He had held her, and wanted her, maybe once. Tony.

"Come on, David."

He lifts the chair and slams it harshly back to the ground. Her teeth jar. Her hair is matted with her blood, and tears, and sweat. She opens her eyes. They are brown and beautiful and dark and dangerous. They smile at him.

"You think you can win."

"I'm going to."

"You do not know me."

"And who are you, eh? Ziva David. Dutiful daughter, ruthless assassin, lover, fighter. You are alone in a cell and you are going to die. Who is here for you? Your father? Mr Gibbs? Rivkin? This man Tony?"

"He is more than a man."

"Oh yes? Tell me how, Ziva. Tell me how he is more than a man."

"You are pathetic." He grabs her face and carves a symbol on to it. From the sting and the blood, she knows it is a Star of David. He spits on her, on the cuts, and wipes her skin roughly with his thumb. It mingles with dirt and sweat and a clotting hope. She does not want to die, but she's not afraid of it, and she's certain it's going to happen.

"Ziva. Remember July?"

Suddenly, at his command, her mind is a thousand miles away from her tired and broken body. It is dusk, twilight, half evening and half dark, half day, half night. A hand snakes around a young waist and hungry lips explore new skin. Dark eyes close in surprise and pleasure. Cotton blankets cover their blushes.

"Fuck you."

He raises his eyebrows and gently tuts at her. "Oh, but you did." There is something in his eyes that terrifies her. Emptiness somehow filled with hatred. The concrete soothes her burning soles.

"You will die in this room. You might as well tell us everything. We can make it easier. Quick."

She smirks at him, through the blood and grime and sweat and impotent rage.

"Quick?" She laughs, and the sultry tone of her voice causes him to lean in. "Sweetheart, I've been dying since the day I was born."

**OK, I know it's not a particularly cheerful ending (or beginning, or middle) but I didn't want to make anything like INSTANT Tony-saves-Ziva kinda stuff. It's not finished yet, though! ... and I love reviews :)**


	2. Of Blades and Empty Beds

It is the nights that she truly cannot stand. When the sunlight streams in, piercing, on her face, heats her blood and makes her sweat, she knows she is alive. But when the moon pours in and the silence drowns her, and all she can hear in the slow, obstinate beat of her tired little heart, that is when the lines blur and she cannot bear it. At night, she cries freely.

She mostly thinks of him.

Curious little phrases echo in her head. _Whipped dolphin fat. Your eyes won't shut up. Must be in the McGenome. _She remembers them all, smiles and aches for him. Thinks of the shared sheets and the electric pulse of skin on skin. Moans. At night, when she sleeps, she dreams of making love to him, burnt out and fading as she is. Their movements are angry and desperate. A compulsion, an urge. Inevitable. His smile reminded her of butter and sugar, stolen from the kitchens when she was young. She longed to taste him. To whisper things into his ear that would make her blush. She dreamed of waking up next to him, in the sweet and golden dawn of a new day. Sleepy cotton sheets and sleepy happy eyes.

And then morning comes, and the sun burns, curls the skin from her bones in beautiful crisp whispers. His boot invades, touching her everywhere as his words are repeated and her silence deafens them both. One time, he stubs out a cigarette on the skin of her stomach. She sobs, the dry convulsion of her body startling even her. She is worn and broken on the floor. He looks at her and remembers what she used to be. And then he kicks her once more, a blow to the abdomen, and leaves her to the night.

* * *

He wakes to the sense of an imminent and inevitable fall each morning. Lands in his mattress and sweaty, crumpled sheets. The alarm blares solid and smiling, hateful in his face. Another day with the empty desk and a stale and hanging silence. And then home to the soothing membrane of an alcoholic stupor. It hushes him and makes him numb and loose inside his skin. He thinks of her. Every time he does not say her name, another memory flashes past. The first time she drove the van. The time she whispered behind him, close and intimate in his ear. The time he watched, through the window in the door, as she played air guitar in the empty bullpen. He had loved her more than anything then. He had wanted to go in and take her hand and take her home and take her. She swallowed his lust with his whiskey and slept in his unmade bed.

* * *

A white blade slices through the space above her. There is no transition between air and flesh. The pain does not increase or diminish. His patience is wearing thin. Her lungs, tiny battered bellows, now strain for every breath. He sees the flicking end in sight, in the glazed and empty stare of her dark, dark eyes, the listlessness of her movements, awkward and heavy as though moving through treacle. Syrup. He remembers what her skin tasted like on that hot and imperfect night in July. He hates her now, blinding and true. Proud. Rips her apart, grunting and heaving. Leaves her naked and bleeding on the concrete floor.

The next day, he is back. A serrated blade. He grabs her hair, pulls it back so her neck, smooth and unscarred, is exposed, raw in the sunlight. She closes her eyes and mouths silent words into her fractured and ravenous heart. He presses it to her skin, feels the flesh break, watches a single line of blood trace the ghost of a fingerprint down her neck, across her collarbone and, gaining momentum, dances its way across the curve of her breast. He pulls the blade away. Hacks at her hair until she is shorn and weeping. She looks like a child, a lost and mournful infant with a dead and baleful gaze. And then he forces her body to the floor and makes love to her. He kisses her scratches and cuts and grazes, the burns and bruises and broken bones and silver scars. And then he leaves her in a pool of herself.

**I know this, again, is pretty depressing, but I'm in the mood for some self-indulgent Tiva angst. And also, I know it's very short, but I'm actually supposed to be revising for my History AS on Monday, sorry :) Things will pick up soon, though, folks, and, like always, I really appreciate reviews. I'll hopefully update Tuesday. Thank you to everyone who reviewed so far!**


	3. Blood and broken bones

**Wow. I REEEEEALLY should be revising. I hope this is worth it.**

**Disclaimer: Disclaimed.**

Little songs repeat and laugh inside her head. Her eyes are wide and rambling. IT has been two days since she was given water. Five since she was fed. The light dims and the voice soften and flicker, then rise and rise into a tumult of chaos and colour and movement. Her breathing slows. She presses her grimy palms to the concrete underneath her, wills every pore, every nerve, to feel the world she is leaving behind. Cold and beautifully smooth. Grey. Undecided.

And then the door crashes open and the vibration jars through the ground and resonates, screaming, in her skull. He grasps her by the neck, hauls her forwards and slams her head into a metal trough filled with icy water. He holds her there until her movement becomes desperate and erratic. Ziva David is strong, but she is human, and she does not want to drown. He pulls her away and then allows her to drink. He watches her as she sits, shakily, and attempts to wash herself. There is blood on her chest and arms and the inside of her thighs, on the soles of her feet and the sweetly diminishing knobs of her spine as it curls around her like a kiss. The blood is grainy and flakes away. The dirt – sweat, oil, dust and muck – takes longer. He sits in the broken chair and plays casually with his knife as she scrubs at her skin until it is clean and freshly and pinkly raw. She turns towards him, eyes wide and dark in confusion and gratitude. She is half dead and waking. The scarring symbol on her right cheek glints in the sunlight. A beautiful star.

"Ziva David." He flicks open his knife and sees the shine of her reflection for a second. And then he advances, pushing her back down. She accepts the crack of concrete to her skull with something resembling a curious relief. She can barely keep her eyes open as he straddles her and leans towards her face with his wicked, wicked blade so close to her eyes.

"Ziva David. Let me tell you a little something about this knife. I sharpen it every night before I go to bed, and every morning when I wake up. When I slice into your skin it is with ease. I do not have to hack. Do you understand me?"

Her eyelids flutter as she nods.

"Good. Then you'll understand how effortlessly this will slip into your eyeballs. They are like grapes, Ziva. I know it's not a pleasant analogy, but they are. They are little sacs of water and jelly. And you have no idea how much you need them. Rely upon them. Value them."

She begins to cry then. The tears well up as if in protest of the words they are hearing. They spill from her eyes and run down into the remnants of her hair. The blade draws closer.

"Ziva. When I remember you, I want to remember that night in July. When you were young and whole and fresh. Not like this. Not emaciated and hacked at, bleeding and filthy. Not with gaping red holes for eyes."

A sob tears from her throat and she tries to turn her head away. The image is painfully childlike. She writhes on the floor underneath him, repeating unintelligible sounds. _No, please, please, I can't, I don't, oh God, Tony, Tony..._

The blade draws closer and she screams. It slams into her flesh. Between her ribs and collarbone, close to her shoulder. Her eyes and mouth open, and she does not breathe. He yanks it away, wipes the blood on her belly, kisses her goodnight and leaves her to bleed.

* * *

He wakes, packs, phones, leaves, flies.

* * *

Once more, her vision darkens and blurs. Shapes emerge from the walls and engulf her, whispering, devouring. McGee. He opens his mouth to speak but hears something as he does so and instead stares down at her with an abandoned and bewildered expression. Abby cries for her, but does not move. Ducky shakes his head and sighs, a sad and resigned expression on his world-weary face. She sees Gibbs. Tries to mumble his name but he turns and stares down at her with pity and contempt. Turns away. And Tony. He is repulsed and gloating. _I was right. You crawl back to me, beg forgiveness. I was right and you were wrong. Little Ziva David. Not so clever now, are you? Not so confident in your own unfounded capabilities. Ziva, if someone puts a bullet through your head, you will die, I promise you. You. Will. Die. Don't believe me? _

He holds up a gun, smoky and blurred in the grey dust of dawn, and pulls the trigger.

* * *

The room is small and square and grey. The room has one barred window, high up in the wall, and one wooden chair. The room has one barely breathing body, and a mess of dark, dead curls strewn on the floor. It is covered in blood and grime and desperation. She is broken and naked. The light changes, bleaching sun with day and grotesque bloated shadows at night. Her body remains the same. She does not move.

* * *

Bang bang bang. Footsteps. Bang. Bang. Shouts. Bang bang, bang bang bang. Boots hit concrete and warm stubborn fingers wrench at a door. It opens, creaking and musty. The light from the window falls, in slats, across a body. This body is covered in pain. It is dusty and bruised. Bones have broken. Ribs shine like grimaces through tight white skin. The soft curve of a skull, with shy dark feathers, protects the closed eyes and peaceful mouth of the young and hopeless. Static crackles. Voices murmur, mutter, shout. Footsteps pound. More faces, expectant and impatient with bloodlust. Skilful hands dance across her breathing corpse. The comforting repetition of one word. _Ziva. Ziva. _Tears fall from men's eyes and they are brushed away, ignored and forgotten in the bundle of limbs and bones and skin and heat that used to be someone they knew.

**Look! I saved her! And although I haven't totally decided yet that she's not going to be, you know, paralysed from the eyeballs down, it's still good, right? Yayyyy *does a little celebratory Ziva's-saved dance***

**Enjoy. And also - reviews make me happy :)**


	4. Waking

**Meh. *Disclaims***

Her mouth is dry and filled with dust. It chokes her, and she cries out, lashing frantically against the bonds that restrain her. Her fists meet cool air and warm skin. Large, sensible hands place themselves over her, calming, soothing. She shrinks away, curling up against the wall she is lying next to. Crazed and panicked mumbles. Empty sobs. She tries to pull her hair to cover her face but all she feels is the velvety fuzz of a shorn scalp.

She is violently sick.

He watches from behind the plate glass, his eyes riveted on her frail and broken form, his mouth set tight and resolute. Inside his head, tears are falling and his voice cracks and tears as he bellows such anger into dead and bleeding ears.

"Tony. Drink this."

He turns away and blinks at the cup of coffee in the scratched and capable hand. Blue eyes, hard and concerned, gaze levelly as he refuses.

"Tony. It wasn't a suggestion. You've been standing here for hours. You haven't eaten or drunk anything. You need to sleep." A throaty sound of derision interrupted him, but Gibbs silenced it with a well-worn sense of authority. "I know you won't consider that, so caffeine is the next best alternative. Ask Abby."

The man with the troubled eyes and shaking faith accepted the Styrofoam. The liquid inside is brown and hot and bitter. It revives him. The white and terrified girl in the next room screams. The coffee slips from his hand and crashes to the floor. It sweeps across his feet in a muddy wave and the cup rolls to the door. He stands in the puddle and his face is drained and tired.

"Tony. I'll fix this. Go, get another one, or go sleep. She'll be here when you wake up. McGee can come and watch over her if you want." His words smack into the man's eyes and leave no trace. They slide down his cheeks like tears and spill to the floor. Mingle with the puddle and he is far, far gone.

"Tony. Come on. This won't help. She's gonna be OK. We found her, didn't we?"

At this, the man turns and glares with helpless eyes. His breathing is erratic and his words are a jumble of confusion and anger and hurt. "Yeah. She's breathing, Gibbs. Great. She's alive. Doesn't mean...doesn't mean..."

"Doesn't mean she forgives you. Or you have forgiven her."

He laughs, a mirthless, bitter little laugh that falls like lead. "What have I got to forgive her for? I killed her boyfriend. She really loved him, and I killed him. And I left her behind."

"DiNozzo, you had no choice. Who are you, director of NCIS? You couldn't decide whether we dragged her back kicking and screaming or whether we left her on the tarmac."

"But it would never have been kicking and screaming. She wanted to come back. She was...testing. Seeing whether we wanted her."

"Damn it, DiNozzo! She's under her father's thumb! Always has been. When he's around, he controls her completely. He told her to ask that question. But I couldn't pretend that I was OK with punishing you, DiNozzo. It was kill or be killed. Just like you said."

"Yeah, she's alive. I'm glad." The silence that follows is stoic and unrelenting. Gibbs sighs and turns away. A sickening feeling of paternal responsibility overwhelms him, so he gets another coffee.

* * *

Inside her head, the sun is blinding white on a shining marble courtyard. The sky is a bright, clear bowl and she can hear the sea in the distance. Swathes of material hang, suspended, in the air. Scarlet, peacock blue. Moss green. Lemon yellow, cinnamon, nutmeg. Black. The palest pink and the most vivid purple. They flutter like flags.

"Tony. Tony!"

The voice rips itself from her throat but she does not understand it, or feel the significance. She does not know why she is calling and who will answer. She hears a dull and desperate thud, like a fist savagely smacking into a plate glass window, and then there are raised voices and open doors and shouting, and dragging. And then silence.

"Tony."

* * *

The beeping of the machines that surround her take her to another place. Walk out of a little metal box into an underground cavern. Filled with white and silver and grey. A jumping, smiling girl with black pigtails and a caffeine fuelled expectancy. Beep, beep, beep. May-ja-mass-speck. Major...

Drumming. Marching. The sound of military anger. It takes her back to her little square cell. A knife, embedded to the hilt in her shoulder. She stirs and begs with a frightened empty mouth.

* * *

"As you can see, we've keeping her on high-dose sedatives for the majority of the time. She's traumatised, sir, intensely distressed, and it's proving very difficult to acclimatise her to the new environment." The woman with the square glasses and kind eyes looks up from a clipboard and gazes impassively at the tired man with the cold cup of coffee in his hand.

"What does that mean?"

"Well...it's really too early to tell, and it does so much depend upon the capabilities of individuals. As she was, uh, a...'officer' with several...international organisations, we believe that her psychological hardiness will be better than most. But still...she's gone through a lot. When you brought her in, she was incredibly dehydrated, starving. Hadn't seen proper daylight or had fresh air in a dangerously long time. And of course, that's without even considering the extensive and brutal damage that was done to her physically. We treated her for multiple broken bones, two stab wounds, one that she seemed unaware of, several cigarette burns that only did superficial damage but will, unfortunately, scar, her head had been repeatedly bludgeoned, there was massive internal bleeding...Mr - DiNozzo, was it? – to be frank with you, it's a miracle she's survived."

"And?"

"And..." and here the woman looks away and twists her lip almost imperceptibly, "Certain tests have indicated that some of her abuse was sexual."

"Can you just spit it out, doctor?"

"Mr DiNozzo, she was raped. Repeatedly. We've found traces of only one male, which has to be taken as a positive, but-"

"A positive? She was raped and you're seeing the positives?" His mind is crowded and shouting and black. He sees naked bodies and bloody floors and empty eyes and knives. His fists are a blur as they slam into the glass separating him from the woman lying broken in the bed. He does not resist as the doctors and nurses rush from her room, as Gibbs steps in and covers his head with a palm, pushes his face down and drags his inert body down the corridor. A sink. It fills with water and his body is pushed forwards so he is submerged. He opens his eyes and sees the cold hospital light filtering down through the ripples. He is intensely calm. And then he starts drowning. He is yanked out, choking and sobbing like a child.

* * *

Down the corridor, a nightmare away, two dark eyes open and they search.

**OK, I don't think I can handle much more depressingly fatalistic 'Ziva's all traumatised and doing crazy mumbling' angst, so look, she's all woke up. **

**Reviews are lovely :)**


	5. Reconciliation, and a little baby bird

The sheets on the bed are tight and white. Cotton, harsh and starched under her hesitant palms. She spreads her fingers wide until the knuckles and tendons strain against the papery skin. She is awake, and extraordinarily tired.

"Tony...Tony."

A man with fair hair and crinkly eyes looks up from a clipboard and smiles quickly. "It's good to see you, Miss David."

"Tony." Her voice cracks and wavers, hopelessly unsure. It would break your heart. The good doctor puts down the paperwork, comes and stands close to her, checks some needles and drips and monitors and statistics. "Tony, I presume, is Mr DiNozzo?"

"Tony." She does not understand what he is saying, does not want it. Her only hope lies in the aching repetition of the name she once knew. She clings to it, desperate, like a child with a doll. Like a rosary.

"Would you like me to bring Mr DiNozzo here to see you?"

"No!" The words tear themselves from her throat like frightened birds fleeing from a nest. Burning. The man looks startled and places a cool hand on her arm. "Alright, Miss David. Just calm down. Stay calm. Can you take a deep breath for me? I'm not going to do anything you don't want. If you don't want to see anyone, that's fine. Alright?"

She nods, eyes wide and filled with a desperate trust. So like a child.

"OK," he says, and smiles once more. The cotton hugs her, snug and unrelenting. She feels her lids begin to gather weight, to fall. Drop like a stone in a pond. She flickers, eyes wide once again, and sees the man with the cup of coffee and the silvery hair, with the hard blue eyes and the mouth that kisses a goodbye to break your heart. _Take care of yourself._

She gasps, heaves for breath, draws in and starts to panic once more. Nurses flock. She cries out against the tide, against the many hands and beeping machines and blank eyed uniforms. A needle slips into her arm. She flinches and it stings.

"No, no, please, no, please, Tony, Tony..."

And the man with the grey hair does not sip.

* * *

The next time she wakes, it is night. The light comes from cold and yet comforting overheads, and the sky is a rich and molten black outside her window. She turns over. Her head feels thick and filled with dust. Junk. She glances at the plate glass and sees him, standing there.

Hazel eyes and honey hair. No smile. There is dusky shadow on his jawbone. He clenches. She meets his eyes, pools them there, languid and bruised. A blank and submissive resignation. It breaks him. He mouths a word. _Ziva. _

* * *

Scenes flicker before her, distorted and somehow grotesque with the speed. A kiss, a writhe, hot sheets and hotter skin. Back to back, _blam blam blam._ 'Not worth dying for', she laughs, and saves his life with the casual clipping of a wire. He loved her, then. He thought she was beautiful, deadly and powerful, proud.

Proud. A gun, some glass and a dead love of your life is all it takes for her to slip out of you, hating you and crying for you as you fly with her far, far behind. Smash into the concrete. Press a gun to his chest, his leg. Shoot him, anywhere but here. Not in his heart.

* * *

"Tony."

He blinks, hesitant and unsure in her presence. She tries to move but winces instead, and, he is instantly through the door. As soon as it clicks softly to behind him, he is trapped, and a child again.

"Ziva."

"Tony."

The silence stretches, wavers, bends in the middle with the weight of unsaid words and breaks like a skein of molten silver. He tries to catch it, but it pools, deep and malevolent, at his feet. Stares down at it and breaks instead.

She gazes at him without emotion. Something deep inside her clicks, shutters up. She watches him breathe.

"Thank you for rescuing me." It is like a slap in the face, and it resonates in the room in much the same way. It could bring tears to his eyes.

"Ziva..."

"You've already said that."

A snarl, desperate and primal, rises in his throat. It is enough to strip her bare. Behind the bruises and the blank eyes, she is terrified and young. Intensely vulnerable, and it frees his voice.

"Oh, god, Ziva, I'm so sorry for everything". His voice is hoarse. Desperate to be understood. To be heard. She gazes fiercely into his eyes and sees it pool. It does not congeal.

"I'm sorry too."

"You have nothing to be sorry for. I killed him, and then I left you. And you ... they ... look at what they did. Oh, god, Ziva, I'm sorry."

She glances at the glass of water beside her. He jumps across the room and hold it up. The liquid trembles.

"Tony."

"Yeah?"

Molten glass in his hand. Twinkles and slips, bubbles, over itself. Water. She is mesmerised.

"Ziva."

She reaches, uncertain, and touches his hand. Feels the pulse flicker, just over his thumb. Rubs small smiling circles over warm skin, golden skin. Honey, sweet and clear. Tony. Sweet and clear. Alive alive-oh. Thinks of summer and his rich dirty laughter and how to her they sparked the same feelings, the same hope and love. She gazes deep into his eyes, unsure beams of dark and bewitching light that threaten to spill over into panic and tears. He makes noises, calming, soothing, shushing noises. She begins to sob, like a child, high and vulnerable and sweet. He holds her, and does not let go.

* * *

When the man with hard blue eyes and the sorrow-stained heart returns with another Styrofoam cup, he sees the couple sleeping on the bed. She is broken and fragile, a curled and slumbering baby bird encased in the tight embrace of a man with hazel eyes and a fresh new hope. Sweet and golden and clear.

And the man with the silver hair sips and smiles.

**Thank you so much for all the lovely reviews, they are all really helpful and encouraging and they ALL make me smile ... and thank you, also, for all your 'good luck's for my history exam! It went really well (I hope!) and now I only have one more left, which is next Monday, so I have plenty of time to be writing a lot more...so yays all round, I think.**

**As always, I adore reviews almost as much as I adore Tiva :)**


	6. She is who you made her

When she wakes, they are bathed in a curious half-light. A blanket of dawn, light as feathers and thick, and sweet. The machines chirrup. They are content. Tony is cradling her with caged arms and a guarded expression. His eyes are dark and heavy. She is curled. Warm.

"Good morning."

She blinks, and the day rights itself. He stretches his cramped muscles, and she feels their power hum slightly under her skin. A bird calls outside her window, and for a fleeting moment she feels it, hesitant and joyful, flooding her. Then she notices the needles in her arms and the tight and binding sheets of her bed. Tony stands and yawns. "I need some coffee."

Still, she does not speak. He strokes her hair with more affection than he realises, and lightly kisses her forehead. "Can I come back?"

She nods, mute and unseeing. Sees him leave the room and feels his absence like a wound. She opens her mouth to call him back but before she can utter a single cry, the man that has haunted her sleep enters. In his hand is a white cup filled with hot brown water. His movements are slow and controlled and deliberate and he sits on the side of her bed. She shrinks away.

"Good morning, Ziva."

Although she hates herself for it, her eyes fill with tears. They linger and spill. Congeal into a shiny cracked glaze on her cheeks. Salt. He raises a scarred and capable hand and tries to wipe them away, but she flinches and a savage whimper tears itself from her throat.

_Take care of yourself._

And suddenly she is sobbing, wide eyed and empty hearted, and he gazes at her impassively with that hateful blue and does not try to still her. A thousand memories spark like fire down electric veins, leaving her exhausted and drowning. Kisses and slaps and withering glares. A mind as sharp as silver daggers and the skeleton of a boat in a darkened room. Whiskey and solitude.

_Bang bang bang and they all fall down and they all fall down so dead._

His face blurs and becomes her cold father, her dead lover, and every man that ever failed her. The tears stop falling and she turns her tired head away from him. He does not leave, but shuts the blinds and locks the door. She is trapped and frightened, a bird, in a cage, with a cat, and a gun.

"Ziva."

Her breathing is ragged and harsh and she feels the panic bubble and clot in her chest. Opens her mouth wider for air and suddenly a hard callused hand is on her neck and the side of her cheek, firm and unrelenting, holding her gaze. She meets his eyes and tries not to break.

"Ziva. Will you listen to me?"

She tries to nod but the hand restricts her movement. She has to speak.

"Yes." It is out of fear as much as anything. He nods contemplatively, and then drops his hand and passes her a glass of water. Again, it trembles, threatens to spill from her hand and so he grasps it and guides it to her lips with disarming tenderness. Like a father with a child, and suddenly she remembers everything he has lost. She wonders if she is part of that.

"I presume your doctors have told you all the medical stuff?"

She nods. They did, and she listened helpless and remote as each bruise and broken bone was explained. She tried to care, and failed with grace.

"Can you remember what happened to you?"

And she smiles. It unnerves him. It does not reach her eyes.

"I was trained well. By Mossad and by you. Do you remember, the first case I ever worked on at NCIS, and the map?"

He does. She drew it, almost perfect, from memory. He had looked at her with new and humble eyes as she glanced up, vague and triumphant, from a quiet victory.

"I remember everything I possibly can. Small details and things people say and the way they lie. And what they do."

"Then you must remember a lot about your ordeal."

"Sir, I remember all of it." The _sir_ is unexpected and stings like lemon juice on grazes. He recoils, visibly, and her eyes are proud and wounded.

"Gibbs, Ziva."

"Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs. Yes?" The words are cold and anonymous. They could be on a gravestone. Once, he wanted them to be. There is only one word that he knows will start to mend her broken soul. But apologies are a sign of weakness, and they sit cold and hard and gloating on his tongue. Metallic, and they choke him.

"Tony will be back in a moment. He only went to get coffee."

"Ziva, I told McGee to take him - at gunpoint if needed - to go and find a horizontal surface on which to get some sleep."

This further betrayal hurts most. It does not sting but pulses, dull and aching and irrevocably recognisable. Her eyes gaze into blue and see a curious mixture of emotions.

"Ziva. I understand if you're still angry – with me, with Tony, with your father. With everyone." His words make her feel childish and immature, as though he is kindly humouring a hysterical child in order to avoid a tantrum. "It's OK to be angry." He grinds the knife in.

"Please leave me alone, Gibbs."

"You chose to leave us, Ziva. Remember that."

"As if I don't have enough to remember!" The words are closer to the bone than she realises, and she is left, light-headed and strangely triumphant. Something falls away in his eyes and a wealth of understanding floods them. She cannot bring herself to look away.

"Ziva. I'm ... sorry. I really am. For everything you had to go through, everything you endured. I don't as yet know what the repercussions of this will be, the finer details of the whole ordeal, but please believe me when I say that it's over, for you."

"What's over, Gibbs?" The words challenge and taunt him.

"Whatever you want to be over, Ziva."

"Oh, touché, sir." There is a power and a lack in her voice and in her eyes that frightens him more than the array of angry red cuts and mottled bruises that coat her body. Not for the first time, he realises that her golden skin conceals muscles of the purest steel.

"If you want to come back to NCIS, I can try to arrange that."

"What, and crawl back on my hands and knees?"

"Of course. You're far too proud for that, aren't you, Miss David? Far too ... right." And it is this final word that slices her open. Her eyes bleed, and she feels herself fill with familiar fire.

"I have done _so_ much for you, Gibbs!"

"I know that." His eyes bore deeply.

"I killed...I killed my _brother_ for you. So you could ... kiss me goodbye. I thought you trusted me."

He does not flinch. "I did trust you." _And oh, how the past tense can burn._

"And now?"

"Now, Ziva ... now I do not know." A sigh, heartfelt and icy. He glances up.

_The bruises and welts and burns. The ribs shine through her skin. Broken bones and a sickening red hole in her shoulder. Notice how her hands tremble in her lap and she looks just like a child. Her shorn scalp and the scars that cross it. They glint, silver and forlorn. She cannot hide behind her hair and so she hides behind her pride, her wounds, embraces them and pretends she can bear it, when her eyes are large and lost and lonely, dark with exhaustion and hunger and a quiet hopelessness that could break your heart._

"If it makes you feel any better, I didn't tell them a thing."

And it should, but it doesn't.

**Hmmmm ... I made Gibbs out to be a bit of a bastard here, which wasn't entirely what I intended but I really didn't want it to become a completely OOC and melodramatic slush-fest (E.g. "I'm so sorry!!!!!" "No I'M so sorry!!!!!" "WE'RE ALL SO SORRY!!!!!!!!!!") Hope you all enjoy. And PLEASE keep reviewing, reading them all makes my day :)**

**And also, one more note - as of Montag, ALL my exams are finished, so, firstly WOOOHOOOOO *celebratory dance* and secondly, it also means I'll have loads more time to update quicker, longer and better chapters. So yays all round, I think.**


	7. You may mend her

Time passes, and hair grows, and some wounds heal, and some do not. Gibbs knows this better than anyone. Bullets can maim, can easily kill, can destroy your life with one casual flick of a finger. Knives can grind and twist and kill you softly and slowly. Fire can curl the skin from your bones in the most beautiful golden fragments. Water may fill your lungs and leave you bloated and blue. But it is life that sometimes hurts the most. And oh, Gibbs knows that better than anyone.

"Ziva, I do not want to lose another agent."

"That's not what you mean, is it?" And she's right. It's not. Agent. Woman. The words can replace each other, intermingle in such a quiet way that sometimes Gibbs himself does not distinguish between them. Recognise the difference. He raises scarred eyes and smiles in defeat. For the first time in his life, Gibbs is utterly read.

"Ziva. I don't...I can't...the relationship you had with Rivkin, although personal, has given the entire agency reason to doubt your...neutrality." She smiles in appreciation. Neutrality. Loyalty.

"I understand that."

"What you have gone through...I can't possibly imagine."

"You can probably imagine better than most." Her reply is quick, but so is his.

"It's a different kind of pain."

"Sharper, you mean? Superior?" It is a challenge, and he rises.

"Damnit, Ziva! It's not a competition! Terrible things happen. They happened to me and to you. I'm trying to help." He stands, the first signs of a frustrated helplessness shining through his capable demeanour. She watches him impassively.

"I know."

"I want you back at NCIS. We all do. But just because...it's complicated. We can't automatically-"

"You can't automatically trust me simply because of what happened after you left." She smiles, tired and bitter, because she knows that, above all, he is fair. And it kills her, every day, in unassuming little ways.

"You understand."

"Of course I do." She sniffs and looks away, and her resignation breaks his heart. She is terrified and helpless, but above all, she is spent. He does not know how much fight remains in her worn and fragile bones. He sits, once more, at her side, and the cease of steady movement jars her. She remembers.

_He used to pace, in his big wicked boots, and fire questions at her, would drip them down over her skin and through her hair in a voice like honey. Tell me all about them. Everything you know. I'll make it go away. And then the movement would stop, he would kneel over her and spit on her face, sharply, sharply, and then the boot would retract and pummel, again and again into her bruised and bleeding body, and the knives would slice and the cigarettes would burn and the end would come closer. She could time her life around the pacing of a man._

He sees in her eyes the remembrance of a nightmare, and tries to make peace with her fractured soul. A cautious hand rises to her face and a voice falters. "I understand, Ziva." And the spark catches.

"Would you stop being so _damn_ understanding? I don't _want_ you to understand! You couldn't possibly. Have you ever been tortured, kidnapped, raped, Gibbs?" She laughs at the absurdity of her words, and continues. "You've lost people. It's probably worse than what happened to me. I don't understand your pain and you don't understand mine. Let's establish that." And by now she is sobbing, choking and a child again, and he raises a hand and rubs small circles with a gentle thumb over the swelling of her cheekbone. It calms the pulsing blood on angry bone that so defines her. A tender rocking in his arms is all it takes for her to break once more. She feels his unwavering breath on her shorn and guileless scalp, and sinks into the curious embrace.

One had a daughter, and then she was lost.

The other, a father that was never truly there.

Words will need to be said, but now is not the time. Instead, they can linger, settle into the silence that bridges the gap between one world and the next, and hope that, this once, choices are not irrevocable and wounds are made for mending.

**Hmmmm. I'm OK about this one, I think I improved on Gibbs' bastardity from the last chapter :) but I realllllly don't want to make it too sugarcoated, so please let me know if you think that's happening.**

**ALSO: I know few people will find this very interesting, but I feel the need to vent my spleen. I wrote what was gona be this chapter last night, and wanted to post it yesterday, BUT my idiotic computer for some reason took against the file and PERMANENTLY DELETED it from my system as soon as I shut it! So if this one seems a little disjointed in places, that's the reason - I was trying to recreate what I had yesterday, which, ironically, I was really pleased with. :( Life is hard sometimes.**

**As always, I really appreciate reviews and con-crit, and a massive thank you to everyone that's already reviewed and added this to story alert etc :) Makes my day.**

**ANDDDDDD (and I bet no-one is reading anymore) MY LAST EXAM IS ON MONDAY! YAYYYYY!**


	8. Oh, but she is far too whole

Tony wants to sit and cry. He wants to laugh and look out of a window and see a bright blue sky. No clouds. No grey. A steam train. A tree, dropped conkers and a picnic hamper. He wants to fuck. He smiles, because he already knows how he always fucks everything up. It is ingrained into his soul and sits so pretty next to the dirty smirk and the quick, cruel tongue. It. Is. What. He. Does. And oh, how he knows it.

Her broken, bleeding body is bruised into the backs of his eyelids. The image pulses, angry and red and gaping, every time he shuts out the world. Coffee and relief and hindsight will not save him now.

When you love someone, everything is different. Although Tony is arrogant, he is well aware that he knows very little about love. He used to think it was complex and intricate, a fine filigreed thing that swam, gloating, into view when you were old and regretful. Now he realises that it is young and transparent and has been staring, wide-eyed and expectant, into his face since the day he met her. And he missed it, and he knows it. He looked past it because he was frightened, and because he was proud, and because he was so very Tony.

And when he pulled the trigger, he was not thinking of himself, of his life or even of the one he was ending. He was thinking of the girl with the black, accusing eyes and the curly hair that seemed to smile and the thoughtful fingers that occasionally played with a necklace. The one that seemed so very powerful, and yet so fatally wounded. He was only thinking of her, and then he saw the hate in her eyes, and only then did he realise what he had done.

And then she was gone.

And then she was found.

But oh, what a transition. What a sickening transformation, a butterfly into a caterpillar, locked up tight in a blistering cocoon. When he was pretending to sleep, he would close his eyes and go over every inch of her violated body. He would always end up in one particular place, dark and sacred and utterly closed to him. And how he would despise the world for them, and for himself. For what Adam can do to Eve. For what man can take.

* * *

When he returns, Ziva looks tired and restful. Gibbs is gently stroking her cheek and she follows the moment of his fingers with her breath. It is intimate and Tony feels guilty for ruining one more thing. But then those wounded eyes catch hold of him, lock on like honey and they smile and shine through the grime. He has no choice but to enter, to go through with it.

_To go through with it and pretend that he loved them, because otherwise they would hurt and another thing would be all _

_his_

_fault._

So he puts on his bright eyes and walks into the room. It is light and cool and the air tastes of Ziva in the most tenuous and beautiful of ways. Gibbs smiles gently. It jars him.

"Well, yeah, DiNozzo?" And the dry tone is back and Ziva smirks in triumph and Tony knows that, for once, it is not his fault, and things might just be fine.

"Brought you coffee, boss." He hands it over with an almost untraceable bow, and waits for it.

"What the _hell_ do you call this, DiNozzo?"

"I call it a full fat latte with 4 sugars. Boss." And suddenly they are all laughing, and the room glows with it.

* * *

Later, after Gibbs has murmured something lovely into Ziva's ear, they are left alone. She watches him watch her for a minute, until he realises she is doing it. As he moves his eyes to the window, she begins to speak.

"Tony, I-"

"Sorry."

There is an awkward pause. Last night he fell asleep with her, wrapped tightly around her fragile form like a sleeping pea in a tender pod. Now, he cannot find words.

"Why are you apologising?"

"For looking at – for watching – it doesn't matter."

She does not dispute it, but instead gazes at him for the longest time with the quietest eyes. He is drawn to her, and, strangely, does not mind. He wants to be closer, to hold her and feel her proud and steady heart beat against his skin like the shyest and truest of kisses. He knows she is far better than he will ever be.

"Tony, what you did for me ... I don't know how you found me, how you could possibly have done so ... but I don't really care, if I'm honest. I only want to know why."

Her words slice through him a little, and he does not understand.

"Why? What do you mean, why? Why what?"

"Why would you come all that way to find someone who chose to ...leave? I don't want to say it, it's not true and it hurts every time, but I chose something else over NCIS. Over you. Now ... now, I wish I could take that back. But I can't." The words are forceful and sent straight to him on a beam through the air. "It is a big regret of mine, but there is absolutely nothing I can do now. But you ... you tried. And you ... did it. You succeeded. But why?"

It is like gazing into a vast black abyss. It is breathing and writhing far below him, but all Tony can see is empty, bleak and bleeding. There is a reason, but it might just kill him. So let's stick to the facts. For now.

"I was...calling you. All the time. Your cell. And you never answered. And I tried and tried, and Gibbs saw. He knew, and he understood. So one day, about 2 weeks after we came back from Hell Aviv – uh, sorry, Tel Aviv, it's just a stupid nickname, sorry, Abby, you know what she's like – anyway, he tried to videoconference Mossad, to ask Director David – I mean, sorry, your father – how you were, how you were coping, stuff like that. Only the Director – I mean, your father –" and here he breaks off and regards her with caged and wary eyes "seemed.... I don't know. Evasive. Gibbs asked to speak to you directly, and then he had to admit he wasn't entirely sure where you were. Then he broke off the video connection and Gibbs couldn't get hold of him again." He smirks, without humour, at the memory. "We could all hear him up there, banging and yelling away. He was screaming by the end. He sounded desperate. Frightened, almost, if that's physically possible for Gibbs." Chuckle. Glance up and meet those eyes, boy. They terrify you. They are pooled and spilling over with something you can't put a name to. just hold on. Breathe in and continue. Boy.

"And eventually he went to Vance, just barged right in there like he used to do all the time when Jen was new – even when she wasn't new, I suppose – and his voice started out quiet and calm like it always does and then suddenly he bellowed _so_ loud – Jesus Christ, I never heard him yell like that before, Ducky heard it down in Autopsy and trailed on up with the gremlin-"

"Palmer. His name is Palmer. Jimmy. And he doesn't like being called the Autopsy gremlin." Something in her voice fractures, but does not break, and again, Tony is reminded of just how much he does wrong in life. But he hardens and glazes. "So, I suppose next you'll be asking me to stop calling Probie McGeek?" she softens and blossoms a little with this, and shakes a tender head.

"Anyway, he came out and just told me and Probie – _Puh-ruh-ho-bee_ – to gear up, that we had a case. And I mean, would _you_ want to ask Gibbs questions after you just heard him scream out a lung up there? Even you with your ninja training wouldn't want to face that, Zee-vah. Surely?" She laughs. He is making it an anecdote, because this. Is. What. He. Does.

"Well, so we geared up and in the van he directed McGee to Norfolk, said we were flying out to Somalia instantly, that Vance had already agreed and had organised a flight. And I was like Oh Em Gee-" she smiles, but something in her eyes makes Tony break a little. "And Gibbs started to explain that he'd had a bad feeling as soon as Director David started dodging the questions, and so he'd gone in to see Vance and it turns out Vance knew you were carrying on Rivkin's assignment –" another pause, and a sharp and unwelcome intake of breath. Ziva remains, unflinching and impassive, and he does not know what to do. So he keeps talking. "And that they'd lost track of you somewhere near Somalia or something, I'm a little hazy on the details and my high-school geography class, you'll have to excuse me, and that there was a danger you'd...fallen into the wrong hands, Ziva." His hands begin to tremble and she strokes them, gently. "Come on, Tony. Carry on. You have to finish the story, otherwise I'll not be able to sleep from thinking about it, wondering how it ends." A laugh. Soft and hopeful. Eyes raise, and they have seen so much bad. It pains her.

"And as soon as I heard, I started flipping out in the back of the van, smashing into things and generally behaving like I'd swallowed a bee or something. It happened to my dog once. I just felt so sick, so...guilty. I knew it was all my fault, and whatever you say – " his voice raises as she opens her mouth to protest, "what_ever_ you say, it was my fault, at least part of it, and I, God, I just couldn't get it out of my head, what might be happening, what I'd...caused. From being such a stupid ... ass."

"Ass?" Her forehead wrinkles momentarily in confusion.

"Butt. Not...donkey. Although I guess the references are interchangeable, at least in this context. Whatever, and McGee was swearing _really_ loudly at the wheel, I think to be honest that disturbed Gibbs more than my hysterical crashing about, he was going a bit crazy too, I think, and but anyway, he managed to get us to Norfolk and we got on the plane and Gibbs kept pacing and I still had no idea what he thought we were doing or where we were going or what we were gonna be able to do once we got there, how we were gonna find you when 'Somalia' was the most specific location we had, and even that wasn't definite, but when we landed we heard about a terrorist cell they'd gone in on just that morning, so Gibbs requisitioned a car and we drove down there, got stuck in. Turns out it was way more serious than anyone had realised. Just looked like an abandoned bunker at first, but then you went in and down and they'd actually carved out a hole for themselves, filled with all the usual terrorist crap. Maps and plans and scrawls of 'infidels' all over the walls. Good time, they must have had there." He breaks off and falters, his eyes dulling over as he recalls the sinking clammy dread he experienced, in the pit of his stomach and the back of his throat and the aching and tireless thud of his heart as he realised what he had done.

"And then – and then we killed some bad guys, I can't remember them, I don't know names – yet – and I sure as hell don't remember faces – and finally we got to you. Just a metal door in a stone wall and there was no sound inside, but I could feel you. And then – you were there, and I thought, I thought, oh, god, I thought you were ... and then Gibbs started CPR and checking you over and found a pulse and found you were breathing, not much, but enough, and we radioed for help and got you the hell out of there."

_And that's how you save Ziva. _The words were on his tongue but he bit them back, because her eyes were fresh and new and full of hope and a fleeting ad uncertain tendril of something he had not seen in a long time. When she speaks, her voice trembles and dips, but her hand over his is true and warm.

"Tony. Oh, Tony. I'm so sorry." Tears spring but remained unfallen. She suddenly seems so young, vulnerable and innocent and traumatised by the finer points of life that make it so imperfect. She cannot find the words. "I don't know – I don't know how I can ever, _ever – _I mean, I don't know." She looks at him with wide and helpless eyes, and it is all he can do to stop himself from kissing her.

"But I do." They break, both of them, right in the middle, split down to the roots and spring back together, incomplete and far from perfect, but full of an undying hope that underlies his gentle caress of her cheek, the wipe of a pad of a thumb as it smoothes away a tear, his steady breath on the back of her neck as he holds her, and the way her bruised lips open and falter for the words that will not come. And, at this moment, Tony knows. He knows that it might not come for days, weeks, months, years, it might not come till the last breath of a dying life, until her final word of forgiveness, and it might happen suddenly, quietly and unexpectedly, in the middle of a sentence or a movement, it might make her stop and be still. He knows that it will not come easily, or quickly, or without work and love and time. But he knows that one day, one day it will come. And they will be just fine.

**Several things. Firstly – I'm not sure where exactly Gibbs et al fly from when they do go on merry little airborne jaunts, so I apologise if it's not Norfolk but it kind of made possible sense to me in my head and I did TRY to look, so yeah. **

**Secondly – FIDJOSPFKGOPSDJKFGIOPDJGIOPJFIOGN MY EXAMS ARE WELL AND TRULY OVER. Oh, how sweet those words are. I went majorly book shopping this afternoon as well, to celebrate, so I am on a massive high and that's why the chapter is so long (for me :D)**

**Thirdly – enjoy. Please. I beg you. And also, reviews make my day and I really feel I deserve them for the essays I wrote today :)**** Tell me, does anyone know (or care?) whether Sources 11 and 12 support the view given in Source 10 about the Hunter Committee? Similarly, is it really of vital importance whether Gandhi's work pre-1939 was of little significance to the progress of India independence (when so clearly it WAS crucially important)?? I ask you. No, is the answer. It is not.**

**But this is. And reviews make my day. So you do the math :) Enjoy.**


	9. A boy you watched grow up

The boy with the frightened eyes and flushed cheeks sits on a hard plastic chair that bites him. His fingers drum on his trembling knees and he opens his mouth and stammers, almost inaudibly, to himself. A man approaches. He is tall and hard and grey. And smiling. Shadows fall, and eyes look up, and they question.

"Boss? I mean, uh, um, Gibbs, um, well, Boss, I suppose-"

"Spit it out McGee, or do I have to guess?"

"Ziva." There is a sweet and concerted effort behind the one word. So much is invested in the right answer.

"Well, yeah, _Elflord,_ I got that far."

"Is she – will she be – OK, I mean? I mean, I know she's _not_, not now, but um –"

Gibbs sips and stares at the wide eyes and slack mouth of the child he's seen grow up. His tone is unnaturally tender as he speaks.

"She's very tired, obviously, and you might've guessed that she had some issues to sort out with Tony and myself before she felt up to fully embracing normality again." An eager and wistful nod. "She's been beat up, McGee, real bad. They did everything under the sun to her apart from actually ending it all. But I doubt you'll be surprised to hear that she didn't tell them anything. Not one thing."

Those blue blue eyes appraise the scene carefully. They pick everything up. McGee looks down at his twisted and interlocking fingers and the tension in his shoulders and stomach eases a little. It makes Gibbs smile.

"That's ... that's Ziva, alright."

"Yeah, it is, McGee. I think when she comes back we should all value it more. take a bit more notice of it. She's something special." He knows before the sentence is up that McGee did not hear further than _when she comes back_. He bounces in his seat like an excited child and manages to slip from the smooth plastic a little. But his eyes are open and bright. Trusting. And somehow, it's beautiful.

"She's coming back?"

"I think so, McGee. Nothing's definite yet; it depends a lot, I think, on how the conversation with DiNozzo's going right now. They've both got a lot to say to one another. We need to give them time – both of them – to figure out what it is they want, what they can work with-"

"Whether they can work with each other, you mean?"

A long pause, and then a sigh. Gibbs backs up against the chipped blue paint of the far wall and slides slowly down. His coffee cup sits, a loyal little pet, next to his loosely crossed legs. He looks tired. And, for the first time that McGee can remember, he looks old.

"Yeah, Tim. Whether they can live with what they did."

_Tim. _So much is invested into one silly use of one simple word. A name.

"But you think, but you think-"

"Hell, McGee, I guess MIT didn't teach you much about eloquence, huh?"

"Um, no, boss. I mean, uh, uh, I – I don't know. Well. No. But, they did teach me some really cool...um. No."

Gibbs actually laughs aloud then, the throaty hope lingering in the corridor long after the sound itself ceases. McGee is on the edge of his seat. His hands are clammy and desperate.

"You think she wants to come back, boss?"

"I think ... I think she is traumatised, and lonely and tired. And I think she's angry at a lot of people, and everyone she's angry with deserves it at least a little. She's not angry with you." And the remark is gentle and reassuring and it makes McGee ache a little inside. "She feels hurt and lost and betrayed and doesn't think she can go back to Mossad, doesn't know even if she wants to, has no idea why her father hasn't contacted the hospital, why he isn't here with her, whether she trusts us, whether we can trust her ...whether she's welcome back at NCIS."

"Of course she is!" His tone is young and indignant and Gibbs raises a hand to quieten him. And-

_He raised a hand to shush his daughter once, in just the same way. She was protesting in a high and imploring voice for him to let her stay awake just a little longer. Just one more story. But he knew his warm and lovely wife was waiting, alone and pensive, downstairs. And, as her pleading squeaks threatened to raise in volume, he held up a hand, and she understood. _

"Uh, boss?" McGee's round and childish face swam blearily into view.

"Yeah, McGee?"

"I think you should probably get some sleep. I mean, you've slept less than Tony, and even Tony only slept for necessity. Like, it was more passing out than sleeping, I would say, but uh..."

Gibbs gazes with his old and lonely eyes down at the linoleum flooring of the corridor. He feels encased and snug, almost trapped, in a shiny rubber tube of light and brisk clicking heels and waiting breath. But he needs to explain.

"Director David has already contacted me. He said he did not want to disturb Ziva but wondered whether we had anything on the terrorist cell she was kidnapped by. I asked him what he wanted us to do with his daughter, and he said he'd had time to consider and thought it would be best if she came with us back to Washington for a while. To clear her head."

The silence is as thick as clotted cream in summer. It reminds him of lazy summer days spent staring out of a window at children having fun and having friends. Now he stares into the eyes of a man and sees his lonely self once more, sitting at a desk with a computer and a stale and heavy emptiness.

"He doesn't want her back."

"Well done, McGee." But it is not dry or sarcastic. It is angry and bitter, and McGee understands. How could a man who lost his own daughter possibly comprehend the ability of another to give up his so very easily? And after all she had been through. It astounds, and terrifies.

"So...can she come back to NCIS?"

"I'm gonna make sure she does if it's the last thing I ever do." And the words, so flat and insincere in every bad movie Tony had ever forced him to endure, are real and glinting in the cold hospital light.

* * *

Gibbs and McGee alternate. There is a row of four chairs, and there is a floor. To his credit, Gibbs does not commandeer the better option as he might once have done. After everything that has happened, Gibbs knows, truer than anything in his heart, that he is not superior. That the _children _he once babysat, the heads he has slapped and the excitable temperaments that he once so openly mocked, have become far more capable than he ever actually imagined possible. As McGee snores on the plastic chairs next to him, cushioned on layers of hospital-issued blankets and some ominous plastic sheeting, Gibbs lies on his back with his hands behind his head and stares up at the hall ceiling. He goes through memories, organised, one by one, each in their own little file. McGee, terrified and open-mouthed, with his head between Kate's ankles. Ziva, falling to the floor with a graceful whimper as the chair is nowhere to be found. Tony's incessant references to bad films that he knows are only made because Tony feels inferior. He was never a marine, and so he watches films about people that protect their country, their loved ones and millions of faceless and nameless innocents. He thinks he is so lacking, he realises, and yet there is something about him that makes Gibbs feel jealous and hopeful.

As McGee nasals on and Gibbs smirks at his own sleepless state, Tony lies curled around a girl with her eyes wide open and terror on her lips. He breathes, low and warm, next to her. It touches her neck, her ear and the curved grace of her head. Stroke her aching limbs and jutting bones until the grating of her angry blood slows. And when it does, she slumbers. Fitfully and full of fear. His green eyes glint in the moonlight and the dusty shadows under his eyes darken. But he will not sleep.

He has slept for far too long already.

**Hmmmm. Not sure. I wanted to get McGee in somewhere because I really like the dynamic between him and the rest of the team, particularly Gibbs (and, of course, Tony and Abby!) but I hadn't included him at all in this apart from a couple of references. I hope you all enjoy.**

**Also: ARGH! JUST when I thought I was getting a break from work, I realise work experience actually DOES consist of the experience of work. And it's not fun working in an Oxford Uni library with literally hundreds of pissy and panicky History undergraduates who ALL WANT BOOKS OUT NOW, NOW NOW WORK FASTER. So, I'm exhausted, and might not be able to do much this week ... ok, I promise this weekend all I shall be doing is updating :) Enjoy. Review. Make love not war, etc.**


	10. An hour of redemption

**Jeez, I haven't disclaimed in a while. Must mean I own NCIS.**

Days pass. Watches tick on, eyes become tender and drowsy, hospital nurses no longer protest when Tony turns off the light, slip off his shoes and curls, wary, around his small and trembling charge. Gibbs makes phone calls. Several. A young girl with a hoarse and hopeful voice, one of the few people in the world who could kill you without leaving any forensic evidence, answers, and the smile shines through. For she is getting better.

The wounds are healing. The hair is longer, feathery light and irresistibly soft. The bruises are fading. Even the swelling around her eye is receding, and they say there will be no lasting damage. Her ribs and hips have stopped bleeding through achingly taut and silvery skin. She smiles more; the other day, Tony heard a dirty, throaty laugh and turned to find Gibbs and Ziva chuckling at a lewd joke about McGee.

But at night. Oh, all through the night...

* * *

Eventually one of the nurses, a coppery, pretty young thing, takes Tony aside and smiles warmly.

"Mr DiNozzo, somehow I get the feeling that you're not particularly keen on Tel Aviv."

"No shit." But his smile is soft and guarded.

"I've spoken with Mr David. He seems concerned about his daughter."

"Finally." The nurse twists her lip, and his gaze flits from her face to Ziva, sat up stiffly in her white bed. Looking out of the window. He does not know if she is crying.

"Mr DiNozzo, I can understand your feelings. But he's arranged for a car to come and pick her up this afternoon. We've decided to discharge her. He has private nurses that he thinks she will be much more comfortable with. It's going to take a while, Mr DiNozzo, but she will get better. And I think you and your...team...will be relieved to return to America." The smile she plasters across her silly dimpled face seems strangely out of place to him.

Once, he would have argued. Once, he would have tried to joke her around to his way of thinking. Perhaps even flirted a little. Maybe even made love to her like he meant it, and then persuaded her to change her mind. Break the rules. And, of course, when Ziva was first found, he would almost certainly have crashed a fist into the face of anyone who opposed him.

But Tony is so tired, and he is not delusional. An arrogant employee of an unknown agency of a foreign country, up against the director of Mossad, based right here in this hellish city. He knows who will win. So he turns away.

She _was_ crying. Sweetly and completely, and it breaks him.

"Ziva."

"She told you."

He moves to sit by her, crowd her with his protection, but restrains himself, and kneels, almost prayer-like, on the floor.

"Yes." A silence, wavering and forlorn. "Apparently your father thinks it will be best for you. A private nurse. Familiar surroundings. Your family. I can understand why ... why it would appear that way."

She turns her head. Without the glossy protection of her hair, her eyes are huge and bleak and so like a child. They are helpless, and hopeless. And so is he.

"Please, Tony."

He does not know what she is pleading for, but he knows - quietly, suddenly – that whatever it is she is begging for, whatever she wants or needs, he would willingly, gladly go to the ends of the earth just to find. And she knows this, because he already has done. So she looks at him with open eyes, and, for a second, a tiny particle of time trapped between this breath and the next, she opens her heart a little too. And it floods.

"Tony. Family? That's not my family. That's not, not my...he's my father. Where is he now? Where had he been for the past weeks? Where was he when you made the call, told him I was alive? Why didn't he drop everything and rush here? Why wasn't _he_ the one that saved me?"

And, of course, Tony has no answers. He wonders – idly, languidly – whether he ever has done, or whether his entire life has been poised, suspended, on the success of a blag. On how his voice is sweet and brown and cracked, treacle, and how people believe what he tells them because they _want_ him to be right.

"Ziva, I don't know, but-"

"Are you just going to leave now? Is that it? After...everything you've done for me?" And it doesn't make sense, not out loud, but it doesn't have to. It doesn't.

"Ziva, what the hell can I do? He's the head of Mossad, and I'm just one guy that goes along and makes it up every minute and hopes to God that it all works out OK. I've no idea what my plans would be. He's _made _some, and that's more than I've done."

"And Tony, you've _been_ here! You've done more in the space of just over a month than he's done for me his entire life! You stayed with me, every night, even when I was hating you, and you put your hands in the same place every time, on my arm and my heart, and I could feel it beat through your fingers, and it made me safe. It made me sure. Because I wasn't certain, otherwise. I wasn't certain if I wanted it to be beating, and then I felt you next to me and I _was _sure. And I know how you used to breathe gently on my head when you thought I was asleep, and talk to me more truthfully than you've ever done, all the time I've known you, and I've heard what you've said to Gibbs, about how you're scared of what I make you feel. And I know all this, and you never ... you never ... you didn't know. You knew none of it. And know, after everything, after _everything¸_ it's just ... you just... leave."

And as he watches her crumple and break, the frailest of paper caught in the rain, he knows just how he failed her. And a tired, bitter little voice in his head tells him he was too slow, and it's just too late, and although he mutters that it's not, it's _not_, he knows that it is. It _is._

**Yay! Stupid library and stupid students are banished from my life foreverrrr. I actually didn't go in yesterday, pretended I was ill and had a fabulous time watching NCIS boxsets instead. I don't know how I'm going to earn a living in future lie, but I DO know that it sure as hell won't be through 9 to 5 workdays :)**

**Again, I hope you enjoy. Please don't be discouraged by the seemingly hopeless ending of this chapter, I wanted Tony to have a bit of an epiphany and get his fricking act together before whisking his beloved away and them have a rampant old time of it happily ever after. Well, it won't happen quite like that but whatevs. Reviewez-vous, s'il vous plait! (Can you believe I'm actually expecting a qualification in French by September?)**


	11. The beauty of a hopeful heart

Gibbs receives a phone call and McGee can tell instantly that something is wrong, very wrong. He starts pacing, and his face becomes angrily incredulous. Flashing a quick glance at the junior field agent, he bites back curses for some inconceivable reason. _Don't swear in front of the children._

"Damnit, Vance, what the _hell_ do you think you're doing? You can't think that he's gonna be able to cope with this just fine. For God's sake, man, he's barely let her out of his sight this entire time! And now _Director_ David, your old friend, just waltzes in here and destroys everything DiNozzo's done, completely undoes all the progress she's made, and for what? For _what_? So he doesn't feel like he's failed, as a father? Well, too late, _Leon_. He's already failed. And she knows it."

The phone snaps shut, tight as a clam and taut with tension. Gibbs barks an order at McGee – flinch, wince – and they stride down the corridor.

"Boss, I mean, uh, boss, what's happened?" And for once, there is no clever reply, no withering look. There is only the hard, flat truth of it all.

"Director David thinks now would be a good time to start giving a crap about his daughter. He's arranged to have her moved to their family home, with private doctors and nurses on hand. According to our dear Director, he thinks she will recover quicker in familiar surroundings."

"What about... what about..." and he doesn't say _us_, he doesn't say _NCIS_. "What about Tony, boss?"

And Boss, Gibbs, Jethro, stops and looks with set and steely eyes. "Did I say that I'd given my permission for this to happen, McGee?"

_And oh, everything will be just fine_.

* * *

In the room, Ziva has been crying. There is a stale desperation in the air and Tony looks defeated, and sights like this break the hearts of men called Gibbs more than any bullets or blades or blood have ever done. She pounces. Savage.

"Gibbs, my father has arranged – the nurses have told me – he's having me moved, taken back to his house (and oh, she doesn't say _home_) and apparently Vance has ordered you back to D.C., back to NCIS, without, without – me – and I don't want to, he can't make me, I don't want to stay here without you, not again, please-"

"Are you _quite _finished, Special Agent David?"

Have you ever seen a room explode into something more than flames and death? Something more than cheering and confetti, and smiling hands and dancing feet? Into silence and disbelief and a dawning incomprehension, a broken man who looks up from worn, tired hands with green eyes burning? A girl with accusing bones and a obstinate little heart that goes _beat beat beat_ whether she likes it or not? It's so curious, so beautiful and curious, how little things can change so much, how words like 'love' are exploited into meaninglessness, yet words like 'officer' and 'special' and 'agent' are charged with something so pulsing, so utterly and irrevocably alive, that to contain them, to control them, would be to fail.

She knows then, quite completely, what her family is, and where they are going to be, and that she is going to be there too. There is a time and a place for a breaking heart, and this is it.

* * *

Vance has sent a helicopter, industrial and functional and not perfect for a recovering flicker of life like Ziva, but in times of emergency one must be thankful for little blessings. The pilots are soldiers, fighters, hard-worn and brutally callused, and they do not much care whether three or four people board. And so four do.

And in that flying bunker, that little pocket of khaki and grey, steel and metal and bullets and death, there is laughter and excitement, a rising expectation and a hopeful bubbling of the blood, as home grows closer.

And, finally, there is something ambiguous, something that trembles in and out of existence far too quickly to be caught, to be isolated and named. But perhaps we should attribute to it a meaningless, exploited little word.

Yes, perhaps we will.

* * *

So sweet is a time of genuine welcoming. There are tears, tears mingling with smiles and tears that drip into coffee, tears that bleed into shoulders. An odd and noticeable group of friends gather, clasped tightly together, in the middle of a bleak and stained stretch of tarmac. Men in uniforms – so many of whom will die – gaze upon the scene with smirks on their lips but hope, well hidden, in their hearts, and pray that their day of reunion will take a similar form.

There is an old man, a young girl, a boy with round glasses and an awkward grace. And, stepping into the watery, blinding light is a stammering, wildly grinning probie, a changed and tender green eyed ghost, and a man with silver hair who has seen far too much blood in his life.

And their frail and precious winnings.

_Oh, to be home._

**Ohh, I quite like this chapter. I guess quite a lot changes, which is good, but more importantly I hope you all like it as much as I really love writing this whole thing. As always, reviews are loved. Cherished, in fact. And I'm gonna make a mid-June resolution, that for every review I get I respond directly to say thank youuuu. :) Enjoy.**


	12. Of pasta and poison and polish

Oh, there will be hell to pay, ass to kiss, and apologies to spit. There will probably be stony and incredulous sessions in MTAC, a spoilt and helpless old man who can't quite understand how he didn't receive what he asked for. His daughter, home, on a plate.

There will be choices to be made.

She goes home with him that night.

* * *

Her apartment is out of the question. It simply does not exist. Quite frankly put, she has _nothing_ material left in the world. And yet, strangely, it touches her very little. The journey back to NCIS, back _home_ (and how sweetly the word is repeated in the downy secrecy of her quiet mind) is blurry and distorted, almost surreal. She remembers laughing, without thought, at Vance's surprised and furious face. She even makes a comment about feeling sorry for his toothpicks that evening.

And they laugh.

And suddenly, she cries.

And then they know that it's not ok, it's not, and it's not going to be quick either. It is going to be brutal.

So he takes her home.

* * *

It is almost eight o'clock by the time he switches the light on in his apartment, and for a second he is ashamed of it. When he left, he had been falling asleep in front of the television every night. He did not bother to open his curtains, or wash up after cooking. Plates, clothes, film cases were strewn across the floor, and more than one empty and discarded alcohol bottles were scattered drunkenly around them. There is a blanket, crumpled and stale, across the back of the couch.

"Sorry it's a bit of a mess, I hadn't been living so well for a while..."

She turns to him, drops her bag full of stolen medication and welcome-home presents to the floorboards and smirks.

"You mean, missing your five AM runs and cold winter showers, or a bit more than that?"

And he bites back the urge to say _It's because of you_ because it's true, and she won't know what to do with it.

* * *

He makes a meal, pasta, and they eat it in silence. It is a comfortable and wary silence, and they smile through it. She winces with each swallow, and Tony is terrified each time. She is vulnerable and wounded, and he doesn't know how much so.

After dinner, he surveys his home – his _home ­_– and gives up. Laughs. And she comes and stands with him and laughs too, but softer and sadder. She touches him in a way that he is not used to. Not from her.

And they break apart and she stands, shorn and bruised, and smirks still. He thinks she is beautiful, and the words are in his mouth before he can rationalise them. He almost lets them out, lets them escape, but bites them back at the last minute.

And the taste of the words in his mouth, instead of in the air surrounding them, in her ears and on her skin...

It tastes like poison.

* * *

They tidy. Even though he protests, she gives him an eyebrow raise and he visibly withers. There is soap and water and bin-bags and air freshener and polish. It doesn't take long; much of the damage is purely superficial. And he watches her, bent over the floor, sees the white knobs of her spine through skin that has endured so much.

He tries to protect her as best he can. He knows, in a way, it will never be enough. But he also knows – with far more certainty – that he will never stop trying.

* * *

Quickly – unexpectedly – it is finished. They sit, awkward and suddenly shy, next to each other on the freshly cleaned sofa. Bookends. She looks drained, but refuses to acknowledge it. And Tony knows, in a smiling and bitter sort of way, that it is better than she tires herself cleaning, because it does not involve guns. Not even when Ziva does it.

And she will always outstrip herself.

* * *

He opens his mouth to speak and realises that there is nothing to say – or rather, nothing that he can verbalise. Before he knows it, he is crying, and it is her – the wounded, the raped, the oh-so-nearly broken – that is holding him, comforting him. Words, silly little things, words like _God, Ziva, I was so – I didn't know what to think, I kept calling and you – you – never – oh God, I'm so glad – what could have happened – I didn't know._

And that little voice in his head whispers: _And you still don't. Do you? Do you._

**Third chapter as promised in several review replies - and I'm keeping that promise too. Enjoy, review and have a nice day :) I am. The sun is shining, and Tiva-tension is growing ever-more-palpable. There's actually going to be some proper, non-frustrately ambigious Tiva-talk next chapter too :)**

**(I love hyphenating Tiva with words beginning with T. Noticed?)**


	13. Fingertips that falter

They sit, cradled in soft light, for some time. Ziva is curled, tense and waiting, into Tony, her face pressed against his shoulder and her eyes tight shut. She speaks.

"When I was with them, I thought a lot. About you. About me. Gibbs. McGee, Abby, everyone. Jen." There is a smarting ring after this last word, a simple syllable with a deafening emptiness to break you. She continues.

"I thought about Kate, and how I never met her. How I only came into your life after she died. Because she died. It hurt, Tony. I knew I was not what you wanted. I was something to replace her, alien and hostile. And it ... oh, Tony, it killed me. I would never have ... if she hadn't ... if Ari hadn't..." She sobs, sweet and low, and he feels every muscle in her proud, tired little body ache with the memory. He does not know what to say, but he knows he must say something.

Because if he doesn't, he will lose her.

"Things happen, Ziva. Not everything has a reason. I can't say I'm glad that Kate died because it led to you. I can't say I would rather still have Kate than have never met you. It's complicated. We don't always have the right answers, or the answers we want. All I can tell you is that, when we found out you were missing, I wanted to die. I've never felt so sick, so worried and guilty and just ... I couldn't do it. I told myself, promised myself that if I couldn't come back from Somalia with you, I wasn't coming back. I wasn't - I couldn't live with losing someone else."

There is a silence as she slowly processes his words. It is not a declaration of love, perhaps not even a declaration of friendship. Yet it feels, to her – just for a second – like the most important thing that has ever been said.

"They did things to me that don't bother me, and they did other things that I can hardly bear to think about. I would call it weakness, and you would call it being human, but I cannot stand to see myself...I don't know. It's not how I've been trained. But I was sat there, day after day, through the night, and I just thought of being back here. Being home. And I thought I would never – never be able to – never get the chance to tell you..."

He doesn't realise she's crying until a savage and childlike sob rips itself from her throat. He tries to lift her face, tenderly, by the chin, reaches out a hand – hot, pulsing fingers – to wipe the tears, stroke her skin until the blood started warming her bones. Leaving her alive. But she twists away, buries her face in his shoulder, ashamed for him to see her cry.

After everything he's seen.

And he leans closer, with forceful movements, prising fingertips, determined to break her in order to set her right, and suddenly she turns, and they are there.

* * *

There is no defining moment, no contrast between the sweet night air and the salty silk of her lips. They are not kissing, and then they are. Her moan is thickened and slightly blunted through the tears. Her breath heavy. They are young and awkward and hopelessly shy.

He pulls back first, a dead, fluttering weight in his chest. He is suddenly acutely conscious that she is curled tight on his lap, is warm and small and female and willing. Once, he would have needed no further encouragement. Once, he would have kissed her again, harder and more wanting than before. But now she is home, frail and crying and with desperate lips on humming skin.

She murmurs close to his ear, and the ache of her breath ruffles his hair. Ghost of a fingertip. He closes his eyes.

"Tony."

"Ziva, we can't. I'm going to look after you. I'm going to help you get better, and it does not involve this." He motions carelessly to her body, curved around him so beautifully. Her clothes – his, actually, lent somewhat bashfully as he was cooking dinner – conceal the bruises and angry red snarls of a wicked, wicked knife, but they cannot hide the psychological scars, the memories they left her with. Her eyes seem bleak and black and angry, but softer and wiser – older – than before. He knows he wants her. He hasn't always, and there was never a pivotal moment, a day when he woke up from a dream, sweating and writhing and utterly electric. Pulsing for her. He has certainly spent some sultry summer nights idly recollecting the taste of her skin, spicy and deceptive, the feel of his capable fingers knotted in her soft curls. His needy hands clinging to thinly veiled bones. Hips and thighs and triangles. Skin, hot and throbbing. He imagined it all, in a careless, meaningless way. He never had any trouble meeting her accusing gaze the following day.

He had never dreamed of her. He had thought, but never dreamed.

Not until she left. Then all of his nights were filled only with her.

"Please, Tony. I need this."

Her eyes are wide and hopeful and longing, the silvery scar on her cheekbone glinting maliciously. Deliciously. She has always been in control. She has never let desire glimmer through her façade. He knows, with a terrible resignation, that she had never kissed him like she meant it.

And oh, _he_ had.

Because he does not know what to do, he kisses her again, sinks into the taste of her and cradles her delicate neck. A hand, dances, almost unconsciously, across her hip, clings a little and then moves up, rumpling the white cotton of his shirt on her skin. Slides up the beautiful curve of her waist, and grates across the grooves of her ribs.

And stops.

He is flooded with guilt, with shame and self-hatred. She wants it, a desperation almost separate to her in force and conviction, and, in a way, so does he.

But not like this. Never like this.

So he sighs, and smiles, and her bottom lip glistens. It is darkly pink and beautiful. Her cheeks are flushed and her eyes bright and shining.

"No, you don't. You don't need this. You think you do, because you're scared and because you've been through such a lot. And because you're home now. But you don't want ... you don't want _me_, Ziva. You never have done, and if you think you do now, it's just because of everything that's happened. It's not real, and it won't last, and I won't do this to you. I can't. Don't ask me to."

Her eyes are enough to break you. Languid and liquid and oh, he's never wanted her more.

"Tony, all the time that I was with them, everything they did to me, all I was thinking about was you. How much I missed you, how I regretted what I said, what I did. How I ... I left it too late, far too late, and how I was never going to see you again. Never get to tell you. Tony, I – I thought I was going to die in there. In that little room, with those men. I thought that was it, that was all I was going to see, feel, _know_, for the rest of my life, and that hurt more than anything. More than the knives. The thought that I might never get to see you again. That I'd left it so...bad. I always do."

He kisses her – tender, chaste – on the lips. On each cheek and the end of her nose. He gently closes her eyes and kisses her eyelids. Feels her tremble underneath him.

"Tony, I think I-"

"Don't." He almost shouts it, and his voice cracks and wavers. Terrified eyes. A fleeting, reckless hope that he knows he must not acknowledge. "Don't say it. It's not true, Ziva."

"You don't want it to be true." And she pulls back, drags her eyes from him and stares helplessly at her hands as the tears fall.

_He loves her, and she knows that. He loves her in the same way that he loves Abby, McGee, Gibbs, even. The same way he loved Kate. He was worried for her, because she was a friend. And it kills her to know it._

"Oh, Ziva, you know that's not how I feel. But that's not the point. It's _not_ true, we both know it, and I can't do this to you. I would end up hating myself and you wouldn't feel that you could trust me ever again. And what we have – it's friendship – and it's too important to just throw away like this."

And she knows he is right, and nothing has ever hurt so much.

"But Tony – Tony, I _need_ this. Just once, just tonight."

He pulls her towards him with safe hands, holds her gaze tight and taut. And his words.

"Ziva. When it happens, I don't want it to be out of need. I want it to be out of want."

And the way he says it makes her feel like falling.

**Last day of freedom before school begins again. Don't worry, updates should still be pretty frequent as I've pretty much completely given up on the idea of getting an education and doing something with my life :D Hope you enjoy this chapter, didn't happen entirely as I thought it would but I genuinely feel that Tony is a truly decent guy and although everyone might want Tivativativa instantly I don't think he would. **

**And I think in the morning Ziva's gonna be reeeeeally embarrassed : )**


	14. Sleep in a crowded room

**OK, firstly, I am SO sorry for not updating sooner. I know it's only been like three days or something but I did promise it would be pretty much daily. There's a stupid problem with our Internet connection (AOL, I want it to die a painful death) which basically consists of our modem going 'What? You want to **_**what**_**? Connect to the **_**Internet**_**? What the hell do you think I am, some little webwhore that will just indulge your every whim? Baby, I have **_**rights**_**. I'm contacting my union.' So yeah. I'm having to transfer everything to school and I'm grabbing some connection whenever I can – which isn't often. But this is like my top priority – that and checking my email.**

**And I'm sorry to the people that have reviewed that I haven't gotten back to like I promised. I'm replying whenever I can, so if I have five minutes here or there I'll try to but it's getting v complicated, so just a massive thank you to everyone that's taken the time to read and review, I really appreciate all the positive feedback and you're all incredibly beautiful.**

**Enjoy. Because NCIS is like totally mine. No, really. Honest. Don't believe me? GOOD.**

She cries, softly and sweetly. Apologies, so hopeless they break his heart. His shirt – the one on _his_ back, on _his_ skin – is soaked with salty sorrow. She cannot meet his eyes.

"Hey, c'mon, it's OK. Come on, Zee-vah, it's me. It's not like _I've_ never tried with _you_, now, is it?" He tries for a joke, forces his voice to crack in a jocular fashion. The words are flat and insincere as they fall, dead and glassy, into her hair. Wince.

"Zeev – please, please don't cry. You're home now – I mean, D.C., not here at my place. It's gonna be OK. Special Agent David, huh? Pretty exciting stuff?" Now he is desperate, almost ranting. The trembling of her shoulders lessens; the sobs subside.

Special

Agent

David.

It's beautiful, to her. To them both.

It might even be enough.

* * *

When the room is silent, filled with the steady breathing of the broken, Tony suggests a film. Ziva complies. Tony suggests a title. Ziva complies. And he wonders, with a dull and dusty smile, what really happened to her. Complicity, obedience, co-operation ... this was not Ziva, this was, most emphatically, never Ziva as he had known her, but now it was, it _was_, hopelessly so, and it hurt to see her vacant.

_He wanted her to stand behind him, whispering seductively into his ear – something about natural urges, something about giving in - and then cackling with cruel mirth at a private joke. He wanted that mysterious and self-assured smile when he said something stupid. He wanted her to talk about how many ways she could kill him with a paperclip._

_He wanted her to not want him._

* * *

He knows she is not watching. Her eyes are open, but glazed and glassy. At every shout, every gunshot, every cartoonish _kaboom_ she jumps a little, shivers next to him and occasionally even gasps, a rapid and frightened intake of breath with a high and rising scream on the top note. He holds her tight, relishes the knowledge that the tick in his fingertips is keeping her safe. For once, he does not notice that her skin is soft and warm, taut and silky and golden under his touch. He sees the scars, the honey-yellow and dusky purple of fading bruises – sees the fear-stained eyes – and knows what he must do. A savage and loving pride bubbles in his chest.

And oh, he is noble.

* * *

Perhaps he does not trust her – perhaps he does not trust himself. But, as he flicks off the television and stands, exaggerated yawn and stretch, he bids her a goodnight, says she should sleep in his bed and he'll take the sofa.

Her eyes betray complete bewilderment, and for once they are not clouded by anything else. Lust, anger, calculation. She is young and scared, still. And so he asks her, gently, whether she wants him to sleep in the bed with her, and she nods, fast and shy. Blushes, and my, he is astonished.

He wonders, for a faint and fleeting second, a lazy contemplation, whether she has ever been as innocent as she is now. It makes him chuckle in some other world.

* * *

He gives her another shirt to sleep in and allows her to lock herself away in the bathroom. The nurses at the hospital in Tel Aviv lightly implied she might be a suicide risk, but Tony DiNozzo – tired eyed, pale faced, half smiling Tony DiNozzo - cannot imagine Ziva taking her life in the company of others. Still, he sits outside the door and chats idly to her as she washes. He has not seen her naked body since he found her, although not for any hedonistic gratification, he wants to. He wants to see if she is healing, if the wounds are closing, the bruises trickling back into her flesh, the burns fading into little silvery disks.

Maybe one day a future lover will ask her what made such marks, and maybe she will lie to him, and maybe she will tell the truth.

Out of habit, he peers once, quickly, through the keyhole. She is stood, shirted and bare legged, staring listlessly into the mirror. It screams back at her, vivid and barren. Her hair is longer than his now, and the soft curls make her look so like a child. They widen her eyes, make them dark and plaintive and lonely and hoping. The scar on her cheek – the star, the scar – twinkles at him gently.

He hates so many men.

* * *

He lifts the blankets for her, like a child, and tucks her in. Her teeth glint in the half-light as she smiles. Peck her forehead and crawl in, aching and exhausted, next to her.

He realises it is the first time he has been between sheets in a long, long while. Groans comically in such a simple pleasure.

And her voice, her _old_ voice, dances out of the darkness next to him.

"Tony? Would you like me to give you a little, uh, private time? Sounds like you could, uh, use it."

He chuckles. It is warm and soft and golden, and seeps like honey into her ears. He feels her smile next to him. Curls around her, like he is so very used to. Feels the pulsing of her white, dead bones halter. Lessen. Cease.

They stare at the ceiling together and tell their truths.

And oh, what truths they tell.

* * *

Tony does not hate his father, but he pities him, and that is worse. He sees him in his mind, an old man clinging desperately to younger and younger women, girls, and he promises himself – vehemently, angrily – that he would rather die than grow old. He knows it is not true. And, in a curious way, he wants the same as his father.

He would rather die than grow old alone.

* * *

Ziva used to be scared of the dark when she was a child. She would imagine the shadows to be monsters, and would cry herself to a fitful, fearful sleep. And then her father, exasperated with this childish terror, told her a bedtime story to bleed your soul. And after that, she never saw monsters in the corners of her room, behind the curtains and in the wardrobe.

She saw them whenever she looked at people.

* * *

Tony lost his virginity when he was fifteen years old. She was seventeen, with long legs and a mocking smile, and when he tried to tell her she was beautiful, she called him sweet and he hated it.

* * *

Ziva kissed her first boy when she was eighteen. It was part of her training, the power of seduction, and the boy was named Jacob Levy. He was gentle and made her laugh, and she never told him it was her first kiss but she knew he could tell. He put his hand on her hip and it made her start. _Ever since then, _she says into the night, into Tony's patient ears, _ever since then, whenever a man touches my hip, the memory flares inside me._ She tells him that Jacob Levy was killed - captured, tortured and killed - less than a year later. And then she tells him how she lost her virginity when she was sixteen years old. At first, he does not realise the discrepancy. And then he does, and he understands, and they are silent.

Tony hates so many men.


	15. Oh, you can't break us now, you can't

**ARGHHH. Fricking Internet still isn't working and I'm considering taking a blowtorch to the modem and going 'Now, are you **_**really**_** sure about that whole authentication failure? Hmm? Do you want a minute just to rethink your stance on this one?'**

**So it turns out I have a very unhealthy relationship with my computer. But whatever, Word still works, which means I can still write, just won't be posted so regularly.**

**And, um, enjoy!**

She sits so still in the artificial light of her temple, her shrine, her place of worship and she worries. Dark, unsmiling lips tremble, and wide young eyes look out helplessly. A woollen hat, cute and startlingly childlike, warms her head. She is curled up tight, cocooned in a blanket.

And this is how he finds her.

Kneel gently, in the dust of her despair. Run yawning fingers through messy black hair and smile. He understands.

"Abby, you should go home. Get some rest."

She snickers. "Rest? Like I'm gonna be able to sleep until she's back? Gibbs, we can't ... not again, not another one, I just can't, and I mean I know that this is totally different to Kate-" and a little silent wince, contraction of the heart and blocking of the throat as the name of a loved and lost one is uttered, "-her and Ziva are not the same at all, but I love them both – different ways, and I didn't take to Ziva quickly – but it's true, I _do_ love her, and now she's, oh, she's so..."

"Changed. Yes, I know. And it's gonna be tough. But sleeping at work – staying here all night – it's not going to help, Abby. Trust me." And he stares at her with that penetrative and reserved gaze, and she melts into his arms, someone's frightened, helpless daughter.

_She is not his. But every time he touches her, embraces her, kisses her forehead, her cheek, looks at her with tender hope in his eyes, he shuts off a little light in his heart and pretends, just for a second, that she is._

"I don't want to go home, Gibbs. Not tonight. I'll be OK here, honest."

"Abby, I'm not letting you stay here. Not on your own. Even McGee has gone home."

"Because you threatened to sedate him – by force – with stuff usually reserved for buffalo!" Her voice is plaintive and high, and makes him chuckle.

_In another place, another world, it seems, a woman lies in a darkened room, in bed with a man who is alive and who sometimes loves her, and she speaks in a _low_ voice, and he chuckles._

"Well, he needs to get some rest. Tony's only sleeping because Ziva's in the next room. And I really cannot have another member of my team suffering from acute exhaustion tomorrow."

"I'll get some sleep here."

"You're coming with me."

She remembers the last time she spent the night at his house. In a vague and blurry memory, she recalls having an epiphany, and falling a little bit in love with him. More clearly than that, she remembers getting very drunk and possibly even breaking his boat. Winces, and he snorts with derision.

"Don't worry, I've hidden the whiskey."

* * *

In another part of town, an old man drives a young man home. One is calm and sedate, the other jumpy and blinking. They say goodnight – a gentle and reflective goodnight – and the old man watches his young companion disappear into the drizzling mist of an disenchanted evening.

The words they mouth to themselves are different, but the thoughts are the same. They are of love, solely and completely of love.

* * *

A man with a boy's face clicks a door shut slowly behind him, and surveys his lonely home. Grey and silver machines bleat chirpily at him, but tonight they only seem clingy and insistent. He ignores them – ignores them all – and heads for his bedroom.

He does not eat, does not write, does not take a bubble bath. He does not read or compute or watch TV. He sits on the edge of his cold and empty bed and loves with such an anger, such a vehement and savage anger, that it terrifies him, a little. Just a little.

He sees the tender hurt in the green eyes of his colleague, sees the way he handles her tired bones so carefully, with such grace and utter comprehension, and dares to hope that one day he might love so freely, and be oh so loved in return.

* * *

Two people lie in a bed together, and they do not talk, and they do not make love, but do something curious in between. Clamp tightly together with a capable brown arm around a torn and falling waist. He kisses her temple, rubs his hollow cheek along velvety curls and lovingly smoothes away tears that fall across her eyes. They catch and dance, sticky and twinkling, in her lashes. He tells her that she is loved, and it is true.

She has been loved in so many different ways, and all of them hurt beyond measure.

* * *

Dawn falls across them all, heavy and languorous. Their limbs are sweet and sleepy and Gibbs kisses Abby softly on the lips and glares furiously into her puffy, tear-stained eyes until he is sure that love and heat are flowing through her bones. Then he slaps her lightly, playfully, on the back of the head and tells her to get her butt upstairs, he's made pancakes.

* * *

A young man fumbles for round glasses and chastises himself lightly as he gets dressed. Stares in the mirror, puffs out his chest, and imagines, again, that he is a superhero. He smiles indulgently, then sees his bathrobe hanging from the back of his door and starts. He is sure it is Gibbs, all arched eyebrows and barely concealed disdain. It is not, it is a blue flannel robe, and it makes him laugh out of all proportion. Puts a shy and jerky middle finger up to the garment and trips over a discarded shoe on his way out.

* * *

An old man wakes and sighs, long suffering, at his ceiling. Maybe one day he will fall in love, but he knows, in his heart, he is not made for romance. He is a guardian, always has been, and it makes him feel proud and protective, like a mother goose.

And the image is so ludicrous that he chuckles, sits up and smiles in pleasant surprise at the beaming blue square of light in the window.

* * *

A geek turns on the radio and dances till he leaves.

* * *

An a woman wakes up to the sound of a beating heart, and feels her own chest flicker in response, and, for the first time in a very long while, she does not regret it.

**Hope you like :)**


	16. Coffee and sharlilas

**Kofgopfgmopfdghopsjgiosjfkdbgjkvldf YESSSSS! Connection is back, at least for today, and life is beautifullllll, as are all of you. Without further ado, chapter **_**seize**_**.**

The day is golden and smiling as they wake, suspended in a honey-coloured glow. A sweet clear light drips over the windowpane and melts the chill out of her skin. He has brought her breakfast in bed.

"I wasn't exactly sure what you liked, so I made ... well, everything." He smiles, curly and warm, and runs a shy hand through his sleepy hair. She sits for a while and accustoms herself to waking to a man who wants more than the night, who actively doesn't want the night, who makes her breakfast and makes her smile and makes her feel bare and burning. There is toast, croissants, a bowl of fresh fruit, and a cereal that she does not recognise. There is coffee, water, Berry Mango Madness. And she realises that she is starving.

She sips the coffee and slowly peels an orange, pulls the waxy strips away from the sweet and velvet flesh. He watches her, unsure of where to sit, stand, whether to leave. She shifts on the bed and he perches, wary, on a warm and crumpled edge.

"Tony, don't be...how do you say it? Frigid, yes? No, um, what _is_ it, I don't know, how do you say-" But he settles himself, grinning broadly, into the blankets and pillows as she falters.

"Doesn't matter," she smiles, and hands him an apple. He cringes and looks disgusted and she laughs, presses it closer to his mouth until he sighs melodramatically and takes a bite. The _crack_ of the glossy scarlet skin fills the room, and their eyes meet. Sweet, white, bitten flesh rests in her palm and the smile trickles away. And then he does purposeful bedroom eyes and the tension is broken like a stick over a knee.

He says, in between bites of apple and sips of milky coffee, that if she needs to talk – ever, never – he is there for her, and so is everyone else. For a second, she thinks of her father, and it surprises her to realise that all she feels is pity.

As they finish breakfasting like lovers, Tony gently tells her that Gibbs has explicitly banned her from NCIS. As she starts to protest, he raises a hand and his prior kindness stills her tongue.

"Come on, Ziva. This is not unreasonable. You need to get better. There's a lot of things that still aren't right. That aren't...OK. Understand? I've been told to look after you." As her face lights up wildly in indignation, he turns to humour. "Yeah, I know, I was pissed when he told me too. But I think maybe if we stick to naked showers five times a day we should just about get through it."

"Tony. Please. I'm fine. Obviously I won't run as fast, duck as quickly, you know, for a while, but I _need_ to be back. Come on. Please. What am I going to do at home all day, huh? Sit and think about it?"

"No. We are going to," and he spaced out the words, pursing his lips with each sound, "watch a lot of movies and eat a lot of takeout. And, um, _not_ go running. Sorry. Boss' rules."

"Gibbs would not do that to me."

"You're right, that's, uh, _my_ rule." And he smiles with a boyish and triumphant charm and walks out of the room, calling back over his shoulder, "I got a great big list of films you need to see, by the way. Compiling it ever since you joined."

She surveys the bed, rumpled and drowsy with sleep and littered with breakfast. "That's, uh, quite a long time, Tony."

"Yeah, it's been...Jesus, four years now." There is a soft, companionable silence, and then his jaunty tone saunters back towards her. "Well, I should probably mention that it's a very long list, so we better get started."

She wants to throw a pillow at him, but it is a sweet spring morning and he is in the next room, so she smiles instead. Goes to the bathroom to wash her face and _oh_.

* * *

"_You filthy _zonah_. What are you telling me?" A disembodied voice floats out of the sour darkness and slaps her in the face. Wrenched from her chair and slammed to the floor, and oh, she's found his breaking point and oh, she wishes she hadn't. But it's far too late to take it back._

"_I'm telling you that what I told you that July, it was a lie."_

"_A lie? What _exactly_ does that mean, _sharlila_?"_

_She is pinioned underneath his foot, his blade to her throat and no mercy in his eyes. The moon shines down on them, blinds her .She is proud and aching and unafraid. And she opens her mouth and spits poison._

"Shakli b'tahat."

_He looks startled, almost. Almost drops the knife and kisses her. Almost. "Kiss your _what_?"_

"_You heard me. I told you I was a virgin when I wasn't. It was a test, devised by my father, my _father_, to see whether I was really good enough for espionage. And guess what? You fell for it, and I passed."_

_She will pay for it, and she knows it. But it feels good to hurt in retaliation, even just a tiny and disproportionate amount._

_It always has done._

_As he spits on her and slaps her till she bleeds._

* * *

"Tony! Tony! Tony Tony TonyTonyTony!" She screams at her face in the mirror, eyes fleeting and fleeing and black. Her small chest heaves; she gags, and is violently sick. Sick, and terrified, and he comes flying in, his face drenched in panic and confusion, and rips her away from her reflection, feels the frailty of her bones and the heaviness of her limbs, and oh, how she screams, piercing, unwavering. Hits out. Sobs.

And he does not know what to do. And it kills him.

**Well, everything was seeming just a bit **_**too**_** happy and sunny and smiley and la-di-dah, wasn't it? Please keep reviewing, especially now I have back THE POWER OF THE INTERNET *dramatic music please*. As always, shall reply to every review I get :)**

**And, um, the title of the chapter translates as 'Coffee and whores' which is, um, an interesting concept...**


	17. One can make the world go round

**OK, I am SO sorry I didn't update over the weekend, barely had any time to use the computer as we had guests staying. I'm realllllllllly sorry : (**

**So, here goes.**

**Oh yeah. *Disclaimsssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss vehemently***

She sits, wrapped in a blanket and shaking. He paces the floor and wants to touch her, to stroke her face and kiss her forehead and rock her till she sleeps. They are a thousand miles from each other, and from anything in the world.

"I should call Gibbs." His voice is hoarse.

"No! Tony, please don't, I'm fine, it's just, like you said, like you said it's gonna take longer, I'm not just instantly fine, but I will be, soon, please don't call Gibbs, I don't want to disturb him-"

His jaw clenches as he staggers out the true and hateful words. "Ziva, I have _no_ idea what to do! Do you understand what I'm saying to you? I don't know what to do! It terrifies me to think that you're not in capable hands." It breaks him; quietly, gently, it breaks him inside. It seeps out through his eyes and pains her. Bitter and helpless.

"I just want...I don't know. Can I have a glass of water?" he rushes to the kitchen so fast it makes her smile. The water slops over the rim, spills down into his worried fingers and falls from the bottom. She accepts the glass – slowly, warily – and licks around the base before drinking. Something low in his stomach tightens and he looks away. A bright pink tongue, and the soft curve of her bent head. Light glows through the blossoming curls until they are fiery and ferocious. He cannot meet her eyes.

"Tony?"

"Sorry, uh, what?"

"Not listening, huh?" She smirks, a little of the old Ziva flickers through the fractures, and he pushes down the black and wicked feeling.

"Are you going to choose a movie, then?"

"Ziva, don't you think, maybe...I don't know, I really should call Gibbs."

"If you do, I promise I will kill you when I've recovered sufficient strength." There is a mocking and powerful smile on her lips, and she shifts into a more comfortable position on the couch. _Relent, Tony. Break like melting toffee. For after all, boy, you are nothing more than sweet and golden._

And of course he does relent, and of course a little voice in his head tells him he just keeps making mistake after mistake. And of course all he can do is try to ignore it and hold her so tight it hurts.

* * *

After three films, she stretches and says that before the evening marathon, she'd like a meal and a shower. He watches her carefully as she leaves the room. Pad like a cat, and oh-so-graceful. He doesn't quite know how she's still got the elegance in her, the beautiful wariness that makes each movement so effortless and yet guarded.

_Maybe she's never let go, _he thinks, and it makes him incredibly sad.

* * *

The food is almost ready. Steaming and complete. He is silent and watchful. And she is not there.

"Ziva? Are you OK in there?" Finally, he cracks. The little voice just won't shut up, and now it is clamouring and screaming in a desperate frenzy, splashing his mind all shades of red. There is no answer; instead, a matching sudden silence within his own skull. _Oh, I told you so._

Without thinking, without rationalising his decision, he jimmies the door – far too easily for comfort – and what he sees stains him a little, jars him to a fracture and grinds into an already open wound.

She is naked, drenched and forlorn, curled up in a corner against the blue tiles of the shower, water streaming relentlessly down around her. It is impossible to tell the tears from the droplets that so coat her face. Her shy new hair is plastered to her skull and her eyes are wide and wanting. The face she turns to him is porcelain and cracked, so vivid it hurts the eye. Bright lips, black eyes and a yearning in between.

He opens the door and sits down next to her, cradles her sapling legs against him and strokes her pearled skin. Closes her eyes with a thumb and echoes _shh_ till the sound means nothing to him. His clothes soak through. He does not notice.

_Oh, I have loved you for the longest time._

* * *

That night she is still cold. Her teeth chatter in a mouth devoid. There are no words and no laughs and no smiles, and he knows it is as it should be. After all is said and done, after the smirks and the teasing and the films, the blankets and hot chocolate and the pretence of tranquillity, he knows that Ziva has always been a little bruised, and the heart she professes to be empty and proud is in fact inexorably beating with unacknowledged love. And – quite simply - she does not know what to do with it. She's never thought of letting anyone know that it's there. And now it is, and it's pounding, and it's making her afraid and excited and so elevated she can barely breathe.

Things have happened. Skin has been scarred. But, for a cynical little second, she thinks that it was worth it. Because now she lies in Tony's arms every single night.

_Oh, I have loved you for the longest time._

* * *

**Yeah, it's a bit fluffy but it's not actually Tiva yet, just them being like 'Aww, you're such a good friend to me *sings a friendship song*'. I don't know how I feel about this chapter. It has its moments :) Hope you enjoy.**


	18. The contemplated child

_There is heavy breathing and a soft, almost imperceptible pain. Eyes that have seen too much for their years open in surprise. They meet and melt._

Moon on skin. It pools like butter next to his warm and gentle body. She curls around him like a lover, relishing the comfort of a pulsing heart underneath fingertips that ache. And she flickers through her memories. They come in a rush, in a storm, and she tries to organise them, settle and file them, control them, but they flood her. She submits.

* * *

The way her father stroked her hair when she was younger. It always irritated her and yet she smiled so purely she almost convinced herself that she needed the fatherly comfort.

How her mother would push her gently away when she entwined her young arms around busy legs. The rejection was loving, and yet it stung so bitter.

The cool marble floor of her home. She would lie with her cheek pressed against the stone, three years old and already so far from anyone who could possibly have cared. She saw the world side-ways up, and would smile knowingly.

That smile terrified her mother and it made her father proud.

***

Talia. So pretty, and so young, and so utterly and irrevocably gone. There was simply nothing to mourn. She ended so completely.

And then, the one that remained. Ari. He had smiled at her, kissed her gently on the forehead and rocked her like a child the night that Tali was taken from them. And she had destroyed him. She had knelt in the blood that she had split and she prayed for him.

And she had tried to tell herself that there was no other way. But there was.

There always is.

***

She had seen the hard, flat resentment in the eyes of man that she admired. She had seen him tired and vulnerable, and yet she had still felt curiously overpowered by such intense bitterness. And, that first time she said goodbye, packed her trash and walked away, there was no regret in his eyes.

Every time after that, she had been too afraid to look. She never knew that, in all the goodbyes that followed, there was nothing _but_ regret.

***

She crouched in the gloom over the body of a vague and bloodied friend. She tried to feel pain, grief, a hopeless wave of aching loneliness. Nothing. Nothing for her friend Jacob Levy, whose company she had so enjoyed. And she wondered wearily whether there was any love left in her.

***

The time she had been sent back to Israel, her home, her land, and all she had felt was panic. No joy. No joy on reunion. No reunion. A simple handshake, a few worthless words and a glossy plane ticket to Morocco told her all she could ever want to know about her father. And as she flew further and further away from anyone that possibly cared, all she could feel was his green eyes on her trembling back. All she could think about was missed opportunities. When she cried, it was only for them. When she dreamt, it was only of him.

***

How the other children stayed away from little Ziva David. How they sensed something feral and crouching in her unflinching gaze. Power, a black and languid control that seemed so achingly empty. Ziva David has stone in her eyes and tears in her heart.

***

When she was fourteen years old, she spied on a guest – she could never remember his name – changing in his room. She had hidden behind a curtain with wide curious eyes and a bright and wanting mouth. He was a year older than her, but seemed an age apart. She watched his hands, and suddenly realised that she was happiest when alone and untouched. He had seemed so vulnerable.

***

Tony had tasted so damn good. Sweet and somehow spicy, and the scent that clung to his skin made her want to spill over into honesty. His capable hands had held her so carefully. A porcelain bomb. He'd kissed each fingertip like it was more than simply an act. She'd felt his arousal against her stomach, and it had surprised and jarred her beyond belief. She was always so knowing, and she'd tried to cover up such innocent shock but he'd read it as clearly as a book and the smirk that graced his lips spoke a thousand words. _Yes_, they had said, _you can make me feel that way. You can do that to me._

But what counts is that she wanted to.

***

The bullet had grazed her cheekbone. Heat flared. Blood flowed. And she still managed to kill. Perfectly, neatly. Lifeless eyes that would not let her go. His corpse rested on top of her like all the men she had ever seduced. Some of them she kissed. Some of them she killed. All of them she left. And when Tony tried to touch her hair she lashed out, panic-struck and terrified. And the shocked hurt in his eyes spoke volumes.

_But you can kill so easily, Ziva. Why is _this_ one getting to you? After all, you can kill so easily. It's what you do. It's all you're good for._

_***  
_

She had cried herself to sleep so many nights. She had sobbed till she was sick. She had curled up like a baby and let the sadness take over her brittle little body until she was as weak as a ragdoll. She detested crying in front of others.

Yet she had cried in front of Gibbs, on Gibbs. She often cringed with the memory. Such blatant frailty disgusted her. But she had cried - for herself, for him, for Ari. For her father and her sister. For Shannon and Kelly, faceless names that caused unimaginable pain to so silent a man. She cried for her own stupidity.

She cried for wanting.

***

When Tony fucked, she knew it. Sometimes, he told her. Sometimes, he hinted. But the times that stung the most were when he was silent and reserved. The times when it was not her business. Because that meant that it meant something, and never had she so wanted something to be meaningless than when Tony loved a girl that wasn't her.

***

She realises that she is growing older, and she is as alone as the day that she left her mothers' womb. Every day, the mirror seems to mock her. She knows she is attractive, but she also knows that her beauty is scornful and savage, and glitters sharply. She has seen happy women, and they are soft and glowing. And Ziva does not glow.

She wakes up alone, and always has done.

* * *

And as she lies in the slack arms of a man that does not understand, she wonders bitterly whether things have ever been different.

**Argh! NOOOO! Computer's on the fritz (faint NCIS-reference alert) AGAIN, which means, firstly, that soon I'm going to be charged with modemocide ("Did you, or did you not, Miss Smith, hack your defenceless modem into 73 pieces with a meat cleaver?") but secondly, updates will, once again, be sporadic. I'm so sorry. **

**Also, on a lighter note, I'm celebrating my birthday on Sunday! Woohoo! Yeah, it's like a month early but yayyyy anyway!**

**OK. That's all from me. Enjoy Ziva's sleepless nights. Jeez, she really needs a break, methinks. Maybe some rampant sex with Tony will do the trick...**


	19. L'inévitable

"_Bonjour, Mademoiselle David. Dormez-vous bien_?" She smiles before she even opens her eyes. The sunlight trickles through her eyelids and warms her bones. "_J'ai le petit-dejeuner, mais il semble que tu ne le voudrais pas."_

"Since when did you learn French?" She sits up and accepts the tray with thin, scarred arms. Tony swallows and turns away. It hurts to look at what has happened.

"Since ... since this morning," he confesses with a bashful smile, and she laughs throatily, "when I looked up that particular phrase on Google Language Tools and memorised it. I hope I got the pronunciation OK."

"You got it ... how do you say it? Um, down stroke. Yes."

He doesn't have the heart to correct her: she seems so content and childlike this morning, and he does not want the bubble to stain and burst. And he'd found a forlorn, charred book in her apartment – so long ago now, it seems – of English idioms, and it had broken his heart.

"Did you sleep well?"

"Yes, thank you." She lies so quickly, the polite little thing falling from her tongue with such grace. "You?"

"Great, thanks." His heart had been pounding all night – fear, mostly – and at half past three he had given up trying to rest and had instead paced the floor next to her bed until dawn broke. He watched her sleeping form as she took what solace she could.

_What perfect liars we are, _he thinks, with a humourless smirk half-reaching his lips. _So utterly compatible. _

And then his reason kicks in and he tells himself that this is what makes them such good partners.

He gave up believing himself a long, long time ago.

* * *

She begs him to let her run. Her hopeful plea is laced with cunning, and the smirk shines through.

"Tony, you know what will happen if you don't let me run, don't you?"

"No, but does it involve you and me and nudity?" An awkward silence falls, before Tony breaks through it with a burbled "Hey, that rhymes," and he realises how much has changed. Once, such a joke would settle lightly and snugly on each of their souls; a perfect fit. Now, she looks about to cry.

He wants to touch her hair, run his fingers through the curls, but it would only remind her of everything that happened. Everything that she lost. And however much he loves her, he cannot do that to her.

He has done so much already.

He takes a shaky step towards her, but she looks up too sharply, too quickly, and he does not know what to do. He burns in her gaze.

"When did this happen, Tony? Not to me ... to us. How we used to be." And somehow, she deserves the truth more than anyone, ever.

"It happened when ... when I let you down, Ziva. I ... I killed him, and I shouldn't have. There's always another choice. It never _has_ to be."

"No," she says, and her voice is sweet and regretful, "it never has to be. There's always something else."

The wall is soft and reassuring behind him, and he leans back until the skin of his neck is cooled by the velvety paint. He suddenly feels exhausted and wants to curl into a little ball at her feet. So he does.

"Tony, please don't cry. I'm sorry. It sounded too harsh, but it's ... it's true, and we both know it. You made a mistake. But so did I."

He doesn't ask, but he wants to, and perhaps that is the same thing.

"I wanted to kill you. You are - were - are my partner, and I should never...you were my partner."

She kneels down next to him and, like a cat, curls around him in such a bruised and graceful manner that he sniffs deeply and tries to meet her eye.

"I'm sorry, Ziva."

"Yes," she says, and her gaze is pensive, "I am sorry too."

* * *

A world away, a case is solved, a cheek is kissed, black lips smile, blue eyes do not waver.

_We all spin without you. We will all be fine._

_

* * *

_

Days pass like raindrops. They fall to the ground and fade, are forgotten. Food is eaten, beds are slept in and bodies become drowsy and caged with something that isn't quite comfort. He tries not to notice how she seems so effortlessly sensual. How she values things in such a way that he clenches inside, somewhere low in his stomach. How her hair seems softer and curlier than before. How he strokes it each night until he realises what he's doing. Because Tony does not fall in love.

And suddenly, he does, and he cannot tell the difference.

* * *

It happens at four twenty four in the afternoon. She is lying on the couch with a patchwork blanket over her rising chest and he watches her sleepily for a while. She started snoring in the middle of a film and he muted the sound and listened to her breathing. It made him smile and feel so home.

And suddenly, she is awake and staring right at him with peaceful, unassuming eyes and he wants to kiss her. And the afternoon is so golden, and the air so dappled, and he can smell her scent so clearly, something spicy and fragrant like amber that clings to her skin, but what he can sense underneath that seduction is soap, white and bubbled and oh god she's so beautiful, _ohgodohgod_ her lips are red and swollen from her sleep, and the imprint of a cushion is still etched creamily across her cheek, and her hair is messy and sunlight glows through it like a halo, and her eyes are sleepy and smiling.

And so he kisses her.

And suddenly limbs are rising and falling over each other, hands are clutching anything they can find, lips tear from flesh and moan, almost unwillingly, fabric is crumpled and rumpled and gone, and _oh! _there it is.

***

He stares down at her with a childlike wonder in his eyes, and she does not smile, but bites her lip and cries with the relief. And even though they are hot and tangled on a messy couch on a patchwork blanket, after slumber and idleness and a half-life that somehow seems to seep, he bends and captures her lips with his own, and smoothes the tears away like so many times before, and she clings to him like a survivor in a storm.

She tastes like oranges brought on a tray to a still form in a sunny bed. Like the coffee she drank whilst she smiled at him so drowsily. The coconut that he had such trouble breaking into, and the honey and ginger drink she concocted with a happy laugh and a vague reasoning that he didn't quite catch. Like a thousand dreams of her. And she does not scream, but she moans, thickened and blunted, and whimpers so sweetly that any coherent thoughts he might have had crumple and flutter into fiery golden ashes.

And oh, how he makes her feel, pulsing and aching and hopelessly soft, terrifies and delights.

***

Soon, it is over, and he collapses on her, panting and slick. He feels her chest rising beneath him, and tries to remember the last time that his world was uncomplicated. He realises it is right before he fell in love, and the thought makes him smile into shy skin.

She entwines hot and trembling fingers into honey coloured hair and feels him breathing inside her. Dark eyes lose their sharpness, just for a second, as she submits to this beautiful welcoming. He kisses her, once, on the lips, and she responds so hesitantly that it breaks his heart.

"Oh, god, Ziva, I am so, so – oh god, oh _god - _I can't, I can't believe – I can't have done this to you, I am so, so sorry, oh god, my god," and his voice trails away as her eyes speak for her. "Oh, Ziva."

"Thank you."

"Don't, please don't – I can't believe – I'm a monster, how could I just – you're so – so – frail, and I just – I didn't even – oh god."

He looks at her, smiling, trapped underneath his weight, naked and unashamed, brazen and curiously guileless. He feels her small hands flicker lightly over his back – a butterfly, a ghost, a woman he adores - and he gently lowers his skin next to her. He tries to ignore sensations. He focuses solely on her voice.

And, oh, those words.

"Tony. I feel...I feel home." And eyes meet, and so do tears and lips and fingertips. Words are lost.

_I adore you._

She is so sweetly lacking, and his love is so abundant.

**Sex! Finally...like I said to a couple of people, I don't think TIVA sex will ever come as part of a long and completely healthy relationship, but rather it would happen once – quick and sticky, so to speak – and they'd try and build from there. I hope people don't think it's too early, or not the right way, or anything, but I felt it fitted.**

**Hope you have a nice weekend, and please review (just don't flame – please! I'm so nervous about this chapter!)**


	20. We are so bruised and loving

**Well, massive thank you for all the positive responses to the last chapter. Carrying on in the same vein here, mostly Tiva development but a little bit more of a T rating here :) **

He feels strangely bashful and shy when she touches his cheek. She is far more tender than he ever thought imaginable, and her skin is achingly soft. He wants to melt into her.

Wonders how she can be so beautiful after everything that's happened.

And she closes her eyes and pulls him closer again, murmuring incoherent words into his ear. Perhaps, in another language, they speak of love. To him, they speak of a subtle and hidden and screaming need.

Instead of kissing her where she lies, he picks her – gently, with hands covering bruises as light as feathers and with eyes trying to say something he can't quite word – and carries her to the bed in which they fell asleep in the same pool of moonlight a million times. He lies her down and has no regrets. He does not think of rules, of bosses, of stolen hungry glances across the bullpen when no one else is looking. He thinks of nothing but her proud and savage grace. And he speaks words so gently they quiver like raindrops.

"I'm going to make love to you," he whispers, as the familiar patter starts on the windows, "because it needs to be done."

They sleep through the sweetest night.

***

The next day is a Sunday, and they bathe in the steady glow of a beating sun until Abby calls, bleary and still half-drunk.

"Hey, Tony. Ziva there?"

"Um, sure. You wanna...wanna speak to her?"

"No, I was just wondering if you guys wanted to hang together today. I mean, I know we see enough of each other but I kinda miss – you know, the whole team, kinda, hmm?"

"Um ... I don't know. I'll, uh, ask her, but I don't think she's really feeling up to it yet." He watches the woman he adores as she sleeps peaceful and complete on his sleepy sheets.

"Oh ... that's cool, I guess. I mean, I'll still ask Timmy, if that's OK, but-" The familiar Tony feels a smirk inside him and he smiles the words. "Oh, Mc_Gee_ will be going, oh, that's a different matter, I can't miss Probie, can't ever get enough McGoo time-"

"Tony. Shut up." But he hears the black and smudgy grin on her lips and is suddenly filled with a warm and pulsing rush of love for the girl. Abby does not waste time talking on the phone, she does not dawdle and ask him how he's been. Her tone is heavy yet chirpy and reminds him of...some trace of...something that he can't quite paint.

He glances back at the dark hair and flushed cheeks and sweetly curled eyelids, and wants to kiss her. "OK, well, you guys have a nice day, I'll see you tomorrow."

Her voice calls out, plaintive and pretty, as he removes the phone from his skin. He cannot be quite sure, but it sounds a little like "You deserve her, Tony."

But it can't be, because she can't know.

Because he simply isn't.

The woman in his bed breathes and smiles.

***

They grow round each other like flowering weeds in the day and flames in the night. Something has broken, inside each of them, and all they want are lips and flickers and voices and promises and a burning lack inside them that is never quite filled. She is achingly lovely, and sometimes, a second or two, less, a mere glimmer of shining eyes and wanting mouth, he is terrified to look at her.

When they are raw and exhausted they lie, side by side, and talk. They joke and laugh and roll about on the floorboards and kiss clumsily and lustily and sweetly and strongly, and talk. Sometimes the words are solely and completely about them – times when he thought she meant something different, times when she was certain he wanted to kiss her – and sometimes they talk about others. How McGee and Abby seem so bluntly incompatible, yet the nights they spend together are frequent, and loving, and the worst kept secret of the bullpen. How Gibbs loves them all in his own bruised way and sometimes it feels more like hate.

How they miss Jenny. How they miss what could have been.

And sometimes – often – they talk of other things. With each word, the dust settles, and the sun shines through.

_Beat beat beat_ goes her precious little heart, and his speaks only of her.

**Hmmm. This was pretty much a filler, wanted to get some Abby-intuition in there somewhere but also wanted to show how the sex wasn't just sex, it's developed into something more. Internet's being an absolute whore again, so I'm posting as and when I can – so chapters are likely to be shorter and, once again, will appear erratically. Enjoy, and please review. I love them. :)**


	21. Do not lie, there is no need

The Monday that follows is the start of a shining new week. Gibbs calls them both into work and, for once – for once in such a long time – they wake at a slicing and painful hour, and try to resist the pull of a heavy lack. She wants him. She wants to feel his heat radiating through her again, wants his fingertips pressing her into oblivion.

He wants her to sleep through the night with peace on her lips and a pulse in her veins.

***

The glare of the morning is blistering, and Ziva does not even try to protest as Tony places her gently into the passenger seat. She knows that he knows she can drive perfectly well.

She also knows – truer than anything before – that love can blossom in the harshest dust, and the harshest dustis her.

* * *

The warm, busy glow of the bullpen is like honey to her soul. She smiles through familiar scents and sounds and faces. Gibbs' tone is brusque, yet he appears apprehensive and nervous. Orders Tony to his seat and Ziva to his office. The slam of the emergency stop jars through her, and she shivers. Winces.

"I'm sorry. I forgot. I just want to talk to you."

"I am fine, Gibbs." She tries to meet this eyes but they are icy and blue and full of rules.

"Don't feed me that bull crap, Ziva. You're not supposed to be fine. I'd be worried if you were." He approaches her, so close she can smell the sawdust and the sleepless nights. Nod and bite your lip.

"Well, I am getting there."

"I'm glad to hear that. Would I be so wrong in assuming that a lot of that is due to DiNozzo?"

Something catches and pulls deep within her; twinges and doesn't let go.

"Yes. He has been very good to me."

"Yes he has, hasn't he?" He places an arm carefully above her, presses her to the wall of the lift. "Ziva, I'm going to tell you a couple of things, and I want to you to listen to me very carefully. Understood?"

A mute nod, and he continues.

"Number one, my team is, sadly, my life, and I love each and every member of that team individually and equally, whatever anyone says about favourites. Secondly, I firmly do – and always have – considered you very much a member of that team, and I _do_ love you, whatever you think, or thought, at any point. Thirdly, I have rules to make sure my team can remain my team, and can remain performing to the best of their ability. So they can do their jobs. One of those rules, as you might know, is about personal relationships. Whatever Jenny-" and, as if nothing has changed in all the time she has been dead, there is a little wince, a hidden gasp and lack in his voice when he utters her name, "has told you, rule number one is _not_ 'never screw your partner'. I'm referring to number twelve, which is 'never date a co-worker'. You know that?"

She swallows, nods, and tries to hold back tears that need to be spilled.

"As far as I'm aware, Tony and you are not dating. Am I right?"

"Yes, sir."

"Gibbs, Ziva. Or boss if you want. Not sir."

"Yes boss." And suddenly, he doesn't like that word much, either.

"But suddenly, I'm not quite sure _what_ you and Tony _are_ doing, and I hate not being sure about stuff." He lifts her chin with a tender thumb and the tears run, hot and forgotten, over it. "Ziva, I haven't been through what's happened to you, but I've gone through something similar, something that possibly made me feel something like what you're feeling, and I know what I wanted to do. What I thought I needed. And you know something?" And she doesn't. "I was right. I _did_ need it." He kisses her on the cheek and pulls her close to him, enveloping her in arms that never cease to be loving. Forceful whispers into the curls of her crown. It makes them burn. "But Tony _does not_ need it. Whatever he is doing for you, he's doing for himself too, at least a little. And Tony won't view it as simply doing a friend a favour. It will mean something to him, I promise you. You ... you've always meant something to Tony, and this won't be any different. But if it doesn't mean anything to you, if it's just physical comfort, it must stop. Because I will not allow Tony to go through all that again, you know that. It cut him up almost to destruction last time, and I won't do that to him again. You won't. If you need it – and I did, I'm telling you that – then go get it somewhere else. You're a beautiful woman, and if it's only what I think it is, you don't need it to be loving – and then go to Tony for friendship and support. He's more than willing to give you everything. He feels so guilty, and that's enough. Don't punish him."

There is too big an abyss and too resounding a silence for Ziva to do anything but stare and weep. Gibbs stiffens a little when she does not reply, and then exhales deeply and begins stroking her hair. "I always know about these things, Ziv."

And she doesn't ask how, because what she wants to ask is why, and she doesn't have the courage. She doesn't want to hear that she is as easy to read as a child.

"You're just human, and you've been through such a lot, and whatever you feel you need is right, _is_, if that makes sense. Be your own doctor, in that way. But you shouldn't use Tony. Even if you still hate him, if you're still mad at him. Don't do this. I know you trust him again, even if you swear you don't, because you simply wouldn't have gone to him if you hadn't. But Tony really deserves love, Ziva, and it's what he's looking for."

"He's found it." The words are disarmingly simple, and now it is Gibbs' turn to open his mouth and gaze into deep, black water.

"It is not ... it is not just sex, Gibbs. I mean, that is how it started – well, no, it did not start like that, I asked, ages ago, I mean, I asked him to but he would not, he said that it was not what I wanted, but it was, it _was_, with him, and then we ... we suddenly did, but it is not just ...sex. I think I might love him. I think he might love me."

"I know he does. But I'm not sure whether you're thinking clearly right now."

"I am thinking more clearly than I have ever thought before. It was sudden, the, the first time, but now...we talk, Gibbs, and I love him. I love him. I ... love him." And she is sobbing into him now, such a similar sensation, and he rocks her gently and presses kisses to her forehead as she sinks, unwilling and young, into the fear. The absolute terror.

She loves him.

**I like this. I wanted to get Gibbs and normality in there somewhere, but also to develop Ziva's character and make sure their relationship was actually palpable in the real world. Lol. 'Real world'. Anyway, hope you all enjoy, and please remember to review – not that I have to remind you, you are all completely amazing at that. Thank you so much.**


	22. Beginning, still

**OK. I'm sure everyone is tired of hearing this, but MY MODEM IS FAFFING AROUND ONCE AGAIN. Does anyone even KNOW what an authentication failure is, and, if so, I want one caught, skinned alive, roasted and served up on a plate to me. That's how much I want authentication failures to die.**

**OK. Out of my system. Now for the big news-**

**FINAL CHAPTER ALERT.**

**OK. I think I'm going to cry. Sounds ridiculous, but writing this has been one of the most important and meaningful things I've ever done. OK. I'm going to wave goodbye to all shreds of dignity I have left.**

***Oscar acceptance speech* During this journey (sob) I really have changed so much. I think my writing style has developed and improved, I've become way more (sob) involved with reviews and I've met (met? Never actually...met, but you know what I mean) some really fantastic other writers, some amazingly dedicated reviewers, and a whole heap of lovely wonderful people. Sob. And it really has been the most enjoyable thing I've **_**ever**_** written. And I only hope it pans out something like this is real life. And here we go.**

**Sob.**

Things fall apart. Ziva knows that better than anyone. Things might come together, collide, might even fall in love, but eventually, exhausted and indifferent, they break away and crumble into dust.

Tony does not crumble, and the nights are just as raw and pulsing. They splinter the nights, but they do not splinter themselves. He places callused hands on aching skin and angry blood cools and melts into him. He kisses the rage away, replaces it with something sweet and drowsing and infinitely soft. Something in her eyes dwindles when she looks at him, and she has never been so beautiful.

* * *

When Gibbs and Ziva walk out of the elevator, the air is static with apprehension and a humming intensity. Tony's eyes are like nothing either recognises, and it terrifies and humbles the man who thought he had seen everything.

"Gibbs, Ziva, what was...is everything...what's, uh, Gibbs, can I have a minute?" There is a look in his eyes that Ziva has never seen before, and frightened eyes and a frightened mouth do not stop him. The elevator doors shut, and she is left stranded in the sea of what she knew.

McGee is sitting at his desk with an open mouth and a painfully open heart, and he always has been, and he always will be.

"Uh, Ziva? I just, wanted to, uh, um, I mean, well – I just, uh. Yeah. I wanted to say welcome back. We've missed you all so much. I mean, we've all missed you so. Uh, much. We've all missed you so much."

"I do not think I am back yet, McGee," she says, but she smiles, because she loves him.

She recognises it fully now, and it almost kills her. She missed him, because she loves him, and that was why she missed Abby, and Ducky and Palmer, and Gibbs. And Tony.

And Jenny, and Ari, and Tali, and Jacob. She loved them all.

"I love you, McGee."

The shock on his face could hurt if it wasn't so amusing. Wide open mouth, eyes, and he is a gawping toddler once more, and he stumbles over words he cannot find, because the words he know don't seem to fit.

"Do not worry, it is not a practical joke. I just thought I should ... tell you. I never have before, but it is true."

"Uh..."

"It is OK. You do not have to respond." Strangely, there is no regret, no embarrassment, no rising fear of sharp vulnerability. She blinks, once, twice, and then the world settles back down and softly, silently, shapes itself around her vision once more. "I did not mean that I was _in_ love with you, McGee. There is a distinction, yes?"

"Yesofcourse, Ididn'tthinkyoumeantlike, uh, likeyeahnoofcourse." His reply is so quick she laughs.

"I love you like a brother," she says, and thinks of brothers, thinks of Ari, and smiles.

She remembers what once was, what _she_ was, what she has become and the aching pressure of those hot and floating nights where all she wanted was Tony's lips and tongue and eyes and fingertips and TonyTony_Tony. _

The taste of his skin still startles her.

* * *

"Yeah, DiNozzo?"

"What was that about?" His tone is simmering, but Gibbs simply raises his eyebrows and takes a sip of coffee.

"_What _was that, Senior Agent?"

"Why did you need to talk to Ziva? What was it about?"

_Sip your coffee and look him in the eye because after everything he deserves that much. He deserves that much._

"What do you think it was about, DiNozzo?"

"B-boss..."

"It was about rules, DiNozzo, and the importance of sticking to them."

Around a man, a world comes crashing down, and every sickening wave of it flickers to the beat of _Ziva._

"And we also spoke about how you can get around rules. Because, for example, rule number twelve is about the dangers of dating a co-worker. So we assumed that, hypothetically, of course, you could have a relationship with a co-worker that would be perfectly within the rules – just as long as no actual _dating_ was taking place. You see?"

Something that feels a lot like sweet annoyance twists his heart a little, and panic frees green eyes, and hope loosens a wicked tongue.

"You mean...?"

"Come on, DiNozzo. I should say it more, you underestimate me. How many times have you said something incredibly witty, blissfully unaware that I'm standing right behind you?"

"Only blissful until you slap me silly, boss."

"Yeah, exactly." And a smirking hand slaps the back of a hazel head. "It's pretty much the same this time. Just – metaphorically. I'm glad I wasn't standing right behind you when you decided to break that particular rule. Wouldn't have been a pretty sight."

"Hey!"

In an elevator, a boy almost whispers the word _dad_, and a man looks at a grinning and sheepish kid and sees only a son.

* * *

Black lips are taut from grinning, and round glasses are steamy with a jumpy excitement. An old heart pounds out the same, staunch little rhythm that used to march to bagpipes and now marches to an entirely different tune.

"Oh, you guys, I'm so excited! I mean, to have them back, it's been so horrible without them, and of course I don't mean your company is not good enough, it really is, and I've probably got loads more work done with them being absent than if they'd been here to distract me, but also the day seems longer and I miss hearing them, and I hope they'll be back from now, even though Ziva obviously needs as long as she needs, and if Tony seems to be helping her to, you know, to-"

"Whoa, Abby, slow down." A big red bucket is thrust in front of her and she sucks greedily at a straw.

"I hardly think a caffeinated soft drink is going to help matters much, Timothy." A gentle voice chides and smiles.

"Well, anyway, I wouldn't be too sure yet, Abby. They came in, but Gibbs took Ziva into his office straight away, and when they were done Tony asked to speak to Gibbs and I seriously have _never_ seem him looking so pissed. And Ziva told me she loved me, which was..."

"Aww! Timmy! That's so cute!"

"Unnerving, more like," he grumbles, but a charming boyish flicker of self-conscious pride shimmers through nonetheless.

***

A woman enters an elevator, and warm hands clasp tightly, and a man remembers Paris.

And two hearts go _beatbeatbeat_ in perfect unison, because they always have done.

***

Four faces crowd a laboratory that is chirping with machines, and wait with hope for a fractured completion. Everywhere is splinters and love and perpetuity.

* * *

_Smile for what there was, and what there will be. Because every_ single _time you take in a breath and let it out – in sadness, fear, delight – you are a little bit different. We are a little bit changed. We are endlessly loving. And we can hope._

_And that will have to be enough. And so it is. And so we are. And so we_ are_._

Fin.

**Wow. That's...it. I don't want it to end, somehow, so there will probably be a sequel, or...something. Aww. I REALLY don't want it to end, but I don't think a sequel would be very good. But, again, I can't see how I could possibly write another post-Aliyah fanfic after this. The response has been just _too_ positive, and I would feel like I'd failed if it wasn't as well received. That sounds stupid. I don't know. I'm going to keep writing, definitely, but I DON'T WANT THIS TO END, GODDAMNIT. SOB.**

**But it's OK. I know when to leave things – maybe. Be on the lookout for a sequel, although it probably won't ever happen, but other stuff DEFINITELY will, and I hope you all read some of my other stuff.**

**And thank you, from the bottom of my shallow little heart :)**


	23. THIS IS NOT A CHAPTER

**Hey guyssssss-**

**Before anyone gets excited, this isn't a further chapter or update or sequel or anything. I am posting this on all my current stuff just to let everyone whose on author alert or story alert or anything know that I'm not going to be updating for at least 2 weeks, possibly 3. This is not because I don't love you – I really, REALLY do :) – but because, in the immortal words of Cliff Richard, 'We're all going on a summer holiday, no more working for a week or two...'**

**I'm as annoyed as anybody about it, but I just wanted to let you all know that I am not not NOT abandoning , or NCIS, or anyone, just that my father would really like to make me struggle across some moors in the south-west of England for two weeks (think Lorna Doone x the Hound of the Baskervilles and you've got it exactly). **

**Anyway. Yes. I'm sorry if anyone got their hopes up for a new chapter or something, particularly for A Quiet Defiance, but don't worry, I have over three weeks in August in which to ignore all my homework and friends and family and spend hours updating :) Yayyyyy, if I do say so myself.**

**Indy**


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